NPC crew loyalty

It would be your choice if you decide to hire them or not. They do not work for free, or magically appear on your ship.

HR is not a real job.

Not a question of pay, tis a question of things like "am I spending most of my limited free time flying between planets to fulfill my janitor's daily "life's dream" mission of seeing the sunrise on a rock on the far end of the system to keep them from hacking my respawn and then shooting me?". or "is my crew going to mutiny because a comically out-matched sprt warship sent me an ultimatum?", or "is this npc anything more than a regular mandatory procedural-mission-source in order to keep them repairing my stuff and organizing my containers while I'm out?"

I think that there is an opportunity for subtlety with NPC interactions and behaviours. What was and has been in games can be greatly improved upon. My post is limited to NPC crew and not all NPC behaviour. I get your point on wondering off on some NPCs side quest to gain favour or get access to a goal. I am not really thinking about NPCs with scripted storyboards, but more akin to measuring opportunism, survival, aspiration, and obligation to choose an action.

NPC casual and formal communication may present a challenge, but could be overcome with lists of meaningful phrases, limited language vocabulary and emote body language.

With a mutiny there would need to be a crew majority in agreement with each other and a system to allow group think. May be a scoreboard on the captains ability to command vs what are the alternatives vs the crew make up in terms of what they signed on for and their personal traits.

I take it that organising containers is a good duty role for an NPC?

Can you think of other useful duties too?

As long as there's something for interaction with actual distinct character, other games that just cycle through the same identical two dozen lines on every character in the universe, or the utterly flat exposition dumps interspaced with the occasional absurd or self-depreciating line meant to shake things up is how I stopped reading the story for the quests/missions in games like EVE, WoW, and DU.

As for mutiny, my issues with the possibility tend to stem from it typically happening in one of a few ways:

-Crew requires some manner of regular mission/quest that repeatedly takes up a ton of my play time to keep them from turning on me. If I'm in danger of logging in to find my cryopod was shut off and stuff stolen by my crew because real life stopped me from logging on for long enough (or at all) to do a daily mission, then odds are it will sour my opinion of the loyalty system.

-Crew responds to external NPC influences with little or no consideration of the actual circumstances. If "Dread SPRT Roberts" shows up with three turrets and a fixed gun and my crew immediately turns on me to save themselves in spite of the fact that we have him out-massed and out-gunned 50-1, then odds are it will sour my opinion of the loyalty system (again).

-Crew turns on me because some hidden trigger/timer/rng decided they would. If the crew is going to immediately turn on me because I was away from the planets for too long, or didn't see an invisible territory line on my non-existent map beyond which the rules that I'm unlikely to be able to reasonably find specify something is illegal, or because RNG said they were all secretly always planning a mutiny from the moment I hired them to take place at a random time, then odds are... well, you get the idea.

Your conversation w/ captainbladej52 suggests you don't want them providing hard boosts (bonus weapon damage, thruster output, hull integrity, ect...) so they don't turn in to just another power-gaming thing you're out to collect, so they'll probably be limited to support tasks people currently use scripts, mods, or occasionally normal blocks for:

-Inventory Management (queuing assemblers, sorting cargo, keeping things stocked up, reporting on inventory)

-Build/Repair

-Piloting while the player is otherwise occupied (transferring stuff between close constructs via shuttle, flying a carrier while the player works on something in the hanger, flying a patrol-route, ect...)

You like big ships, I'll guess you like multiplayer and ship fleets.

I will take it that when things are breaking you need to fix everything at the same time.

It would be good to have advanced multi-targetting.

Its good to have someone to take care of the grind.

If you do not wish to manage an NPC crew then hire an NPC crew manager to do it for you!

Getting buffs from NPCs - no, that is for other play pens, not SE.

If you enjoy a lot of empty, then stick to SE1,

I think NPCs can offer a lot of liveliness to SE2 for both single and multiplayer.

Having dumb NPCs will not help, that is most other games.

SE2s NPCs should be reactive, have there own goals and routines, even career paths, not just place holders for set interactions.

Player engagement with NPCs should be a game positive experience without being a chore.

@Deon: There's a few things to unpack here so I'm going to address key parts of your post with a few out of order.

"I think NPCs can offer a lot of liveliness to SE2 for both single and multiplayer."

In this instance I agree. What I don't agree with is the extra stuff you're proposing to tack on.

"Player engagement with NPCs should be a game positive experience without being a chore."

Agreed which is why I think what's been proposed above is a bad idea and would become a chore. More on this in another section.

"It would be good to have advanced multi-targetting."

Relevance?

"You like big ships, I'll guess you like multiplayer and ship fleets.

I will take it that when things are breaking you need to fix everything at the same time."

My stance would be the same whether it's a large ship or a big ship we're talking about.

"If you enjoy a lot of empty, then stick to SE1,"

Simply because I disagree with an idea doesn't mean I want a carbon copy/paste of SE1. I would love to see the world be more lively, but see above, this aint it. I want the additions to SE2 and even SE1 to be meaningful. And not purely something that as you said would become a chore.

"If you do not wish to manage an NPC crew then hire an NPC crew manager to do it for you!

Having dumb NPCs will not help, that is most other games."

If I can just hire a manager to manage the crew for me then what's the point of interacting with the crew in the first place? All you've done is introduce another layer of management as I'm still going to have to manage the crew, only now I'm managing the managers vs directly interacting with the crew.

Also how smart are you wanting to make these NPCs? Because you don't need ultra smart NPCs in order to have a meaningful impact. As just one example having an NPC I can tell to sit in a chair and pilot the ship to (destination here) while I'm repairing it or taking care of other stuff on its own is a big deal. Or having the NPC be the one to effect certain repairs while I'm flying us somewhere. Or if he knows I'm repairing a jump drive that got damaged and he sees I ran out of parts, he can fetch some. You do not need hyper intelligent NPCs to have something good.

"SE2s NPCs should be reactive, have there own goals and routines, even career paths, not just place holders for set interactions.

Getting buffs from NPCs - no, that is for other play pens, not SE."

Define reactive. Because your definition and my definition are going to likely be different based on what you're saying here. Also from what you're describing now, this has gone from simply should NPC crews exist and have a loyalty mechanic you have to worry about, to basically wanting NPC androids as smart as the player.

First, if I'm looking to hire an NPC to take care of something and I have to worry about him trying to mutiny and potentially steal my ship from me or shoot me in the back because I wouldn't cater to his goals all the time or routine, I'm just not going to bother with the NPCs to start with and there goes the purpose of the entire system as I will never use it. Leaving if I attack their faction or choose not to extend their contract is one thing, but a mutiny because I don't want to do what amounts to side quests and potentially losing my grids because one of them domed me in the back of the head when I wasn't looking, that's a heaping steaming stinking bag of screw that noise. Doing quests to make them slightly more effective at their role is one thing as there is actual benefit there. However depending on how complex the loyalty system is and how often I'm going to have to do stuff, especially for larger ships that may require more NPCs as you mentioned, it ceases to be about the engineering and becomes a daycare center for NPC crew members where I'm more worried about them than anything else. And quite frankly that just doesn't sound fun to me.

As for buffs, I suggested that as a benefit to the NPCs to differentiate them. You say you want them to have their own career paths, goals and so on, yet wanting them to grant benefits for advancing those careers is somehow an issue? If I hire an NPC for repairs and another to navigate and I've done more work with the repair NPC and advanced his career path more, why would I not have some kind of benefit for that whether it's increased buffs to repair rate or similar? What's the point to advancing the career path of the NPCs or similar if I get nothing out of it?

I have to ask at this juncture dude, what exactly do you want and what exactly are you proposing? Because on one hand you say you want NPCs for us to interact with, yet now I can hire a crew manager to do everything for me thus meaning I don't even have to interact with the NPC crew I hired beyond setting the tasks of the manager. You say you want them to have career paths, their own goals, and routines, but wanting to see benefits that reflect their advancement to those goals and career paths is somehow an issue. You don't want them to be purely place holders for set interactions and to be dumb, yet if I can just set it and forget it or hire a manager to do everything, that's pretty much a set of dumb NPCs with extra steps.

I'm not against NPCs being added. However I do not support the idea of a loyalty thing as proposed above. If you want to make the NPCs "adjust" to their new environment and advance careers or such, there are better ways to do it than this. If I have to worry about Johnny 2x4 the NPC and his brothers trying to mutiny against me and take the ship because I didn't want to do their quest to go see the monolith on Mars, then I'm just not going to interact with the NPCs at all or want them in the game because aint nobody got time for that nonsense.

Do they dream of electric sheep?

I am talking about humanoid organic NPC sims, not androids, nor robots or vending machines with attitude.

Your obligation to NPC crew hires

My expectation is that you do not get to keep your NPCs, that they reach a destination where their goals diverge from yours, then they would end the contract with you and leave.

NPC goals

You do not have to do anything with their goals unless you have contracted to do so.

What do you get out of it?

This depends on your expectations, why bother with character NPCs at all? Do you just want the appearance of busy, like on a movie back screen with bodies moving around as if they were doing something. Do you need a someone to stand behind the counter, buy and sell, and stay there 24/7? Do you want scripted story encounters that repeat and become tiresome? Do you want to forget that you have a crew and just bathe in the power that they bring you?

It is time to embrace the future.

You get liveliness, you get company, you get emergent behaviour, you get less predictability, you get support with routine tasks. you get social and anti-social interaction, you get a squad in battle and you get to go to the disco together, and may be a couple of games of pool.(need smaller detail sphere block for this:)

Every NPC should have a reason and a journey.

Mutiny

I suppose that if you were used to working in an environment where your colleagues were trying to undermine you, then you would be looking over your shoulder all of the time. This is not what I had in mind, this would be more about you undermining yourself through dubious actions like slave trading, or running contraband when your crew thinks that your medieval nature should be put to rest. Alternatively you could have hired a bunch of scallywags whom are all for your wicked ways.

Johnny2x4

What have you got against Johnny, you keep giving him flak. Give the guy a break.

I hope that you have taken to writing books, If you have not, you should consider it.

(no sarcasm intended)

@Deon: Oh boy where to start as we're even more off course than previous. But unto the breech we go once more.

"I am talking about humanoid organic NPC sims, not androids, nor robots or vending machines with attitude."

I'm aware and I stand by my previous statements. I have no problems seeing NPCs get added. What I do have issue with is the prospect of a loyalty system as you've proposed it above.

"My expectation is that you do not get to keep your NPCs, that they reach a destination where their goals diverge from yours, then they would end the contract with you and leave."

Okay if I'm having to constantly replace NPCs in my crew outside of one I may have hired for a contract mission, what's the purpose of my even hiring the NPCs at all? Like legitimately, why would I want to keep wasting time and resources constantly replacing NPCs that decide to leave unless they were killed? That does not sound fun to me at all and would be more irritating than anything else. At that point I just wouldn't even bother with the system. If in a particular day I only have say an hour to play, I don't want to spend said hour going through the chore of replacing NPCs that decided to leave because of one reason or another. I would rather get something done.

"You do not have to do anything with their goals unless you have contracted to do so."

This statement and the one above can't both be true at the same time. If I'm constantly having to replace crew because I don't get to keep them, then yeah I'm having to interact with that stuff. If I get to keep them outside of something like death or them being a temporary crewmate for a mission, then the second statement is true that I'm not forced to do anything.

"This depends on your expectations, why bother with character NPCs at all? Do you just want the appearance of busy, like on a movie back screen with bodies moving around as if they were doing something. Do you need a someone to stand behind the counter, buy and sell, and stay there 24/7? Do you want scripted story encounters that repeat and become tiresome? Do you want to forget that you have a crew and just bathe in the power that they bring you?"

First, this was supposed to be about you proposing a loyalty mechanic for NPC crews. How on earth are we now over here? That said, I expect that if I'm hiring a crew they're actually a crew. I expect that if I recruit an engineer he does engineer things, if I recruit a gunner he does gunner things, if I recruit a medic he does medic stuff, if I recruit a security officer he does security things, if I want to hire Lurch to stand there and look intimidating then I expect him to do just that. At some point there is only so many things Keen could program an NPC to do in a day. You forget it takes time, resources, cash, and manpower to make those things a reality. I wish it was like a genie where we could just hand the genie a piece of paper with everything on it and the genie snaps his fingers and it's done.

"You get liveliness, you get company, you get emergent behaviour, you get less predictability, you get support with routine tasks. you get social and anti-social interaction, you get a squad in battle and you get to go to the disco together, and may be a couple of games of pool.(need smaller detail sphere block for this:)

Every NPC should have a reason and a journey."

See above, everything you're proposing takes resources, time, manpower, and cash to pull off and there is only so much they can do in a day. All of that can be done without me having to worry about replacing crew every other second of the day or worrying about if they're going to stab me in the back because of some hidden trigger or similar as Tael pointed out. Star Trek Online while not perfect allows us to customize our bridge officers, give them a name, backstory, fix their equipment, and so on. Their system isn't perfect but it's a prime example of being able to make the NPCs feel like a crew without all the extra stuff of worrying whether they're going to shank me and throw my corpse out the airlock before taking the ship on a joyride.

"I suppose that if you were used to working in an environment where your colleagues were trying to undermine you, then you would be looking over your shoulder all of the time. This is not what I had in mind, this would be more about you undermining yourself through dubious actions like slave trading, or running contraband when your crew thinks that your medieval nature should be put to rest. Alternatively you could have hired a bunch of scallywags whom are all for your wicked ways."

And the bit in bold is precisely the point. Tael outlined several scenarios above that would be instant turn offs for me and most people ever interacting with the crew system. Why would I risk hiring/recruiting an NPC if I'm always going to have to worry about whether they stab me in the back and steal the ship because of some hidden trigger, me not doing some kind of maintenance quest, or something else that's hidden from me? Again I do not find that fun nor do I know anyone else that does or would either. With as much time as people sometimes put into their builds and such, I know I would be pissed if I had to take off for say 2 weeks due to life and didn't get to play, only to come back and realize a ship I spent the better part of a month manufacturing was gone and I lost everything because oopsie the NPC got mad that I didn't do (insert trigger and/or quest here). And when I say pissed I'm talking delete the world and start over or potentially refund the game pissed. Stuff like that is non-negotiable and an automatic deal breaker.

It would be one thing for a crew member to leave because I'm attacking their former faction or such, but see again that I don't want to have to replace NPCs every other minute because one of them doesn't like that I sneezed at the wrong time. Again that is not fun. With something like various crew mechanics they don't need to be overly complicated. But seriously dude, I'm still not seeing the value in the system you're proposing.

"I hope that you have taken to writing books, If you have not, you should consider it."

I do if you must know. Perhaps not full books but various medium.

So you think that NPCs should have a specific skill rather than be able to cover a range of varied duties or do you think that they could do both?

What is your opinion on having space police in SE?

Should they have loyalty issues?

Loyalty at its best.

On the look out for cheese smugglers.

Having space-cops or NPC-faction-navy/bounty-hunters come after you for smuggling or being a loot-goblin whenever you see their stuff would be cool, but that's a different mechanic entirely and deserves its own thread.

Anyways... the idea isn't impossible to implement, but its been done badly so many times that it would take a lot of very careful consideration and work to be anything more than "that annoying feature nobody uses", especially in multiplayer where things will need a substantial amount of randomization lest you risk the "Inexplicably Identical Individuals", "You All Look Familiar", or "Recurring Extra" tropes making a feature people will already be hesitant to use look cheap and tacked on.

I never cease to be surprised and delighted by the ingenuity of game developers that have their hearts in the games that they code. Every few years I hear people say 'that's impossible', only to see it being done within the next 18 months. If you do not dream of what could be, then how can you make it happen?