Starfarer

[NuclearWoo]

I have a starfarer when it was still 2 crew ship but now it being 7 crew ship, I know I dont need all 7, I am not sure if I want the ship any more.  I may end up melting it later when another ship that interests me comes up for sale.

[Cray-Z]

I have a starfarer when it was still 2 crew ship but now it being 7 crew ship, I know I dont need all 7, I am not sure if I want the ship any more. I may end up melting it later when another ship that interests me comes up for sale.

My plan is to hire NPC whores and teach them how to man turrets while they aren't engaged in "other activities" on board, haha

[PaulC2K]

I have a starfarer when it was still 2 crew ship but now it being 7 crew ship, I know I dont need all 7, I am not sure if I want the ship any more.  I may end up melting it later when another ship that interests me comes up for sale.

Thats one thing thats kinda left me rather surprised. Its not like anything has actually changed, its had 2 point defence guns added onto the rear, but my understanding is they're completely automated so wont require someone to operate them.

What i'd like to know, and this applies to all ships, is when it says 'crew' i wish it listed the optimal number to fly, and the total number of 'action seats'.

The 'optimal' would be Pilot + essential crew. So if we're talking about an exploration ship (Carrack), its pilot, gunners, someone on the scanner. If its a combat ship (Retaliator), pilot, gunners, guy to reload torpedoes.

Maybe optimal isnt the right term, but the Starfarer might be perfectly functional having a pilot, 3 gunners, and a 5th person covering power management, scanners, that sort of stuff. So 5 people would be the goldilocks amount, not too hot/many, not too cold/few - just right. Yet it says 7 because there are 7 seats where something CAN be done. So you COULD go Pilot, Gunner x3, comms, scanner, & power management.

I've no idea what they had in mind for 2 seats originally though. The only thing i can imagine is they thought the side turrets would be automated or something? Its hard to imagine the pilot controlling them the way they work, their FOV doesnt mesh well with the pilots. A gunner up top, and a pilot doing everything else - thats excessive too. I have no idea how they arrived at 2 tbh.

[FoxChard]

Paul,  I think we'll get a little more definition this week on what gas mining and refueling will entail.  They explained what the Hull crew does (I think-Pilot, Engineer and three Gunners) so hopefully since we're getting a Q&A treatment they'll do us the same favor.  I hope right now I just hope that I can slave all guns forward, give a gunner the rear guns (yes, multiple turrets! OMG) and have another gunner or engineer for other tasks as needed.  I do think (based on the Freelancer commercial) that the "cheek" turrets can face outwards but probably can't get full functionality if slaved forwards.  

 

I too plan on flying with little crew, probably just me and my two alts and hopefully this is enough to manage it properly.

[GeraldEvans]

Two PDTs added to the back?  It lists three manned turrets. If you can point to the other two (other than the obvious one on top) I'm curious to hear where they are.

[FoxChard]

Gerald, if you look at the concept picks they are hanging off the pylons that extend out back.  Just scroll up and look for the pick with a full rear view of the ship.  Total: 4x guns of probably S1

[GeraldEvans]

I'm not trying to be dense here, but I see those on the back. My issue is that the detail on hardpoints lists three manned turrets. PDTs are not mentioned. If you can show where they are I'd be very happy.

[PaulC2K]

Yeah, they're attached where the rear spoiler mounts to the rest of the ship. They were added about 9 months ago i think, they werent originally there, but i suspect the devs responded to the communities concerns about how vulnerable the ship was from behind. Its a huge blind-spot for the guns, and a half-capable pilot could sit in that blind-spot and a Starfarer doesnt have the manoeuvrability to shake them off and get line of sight on them.

-edit-

The 3 'manned' turrets, i'd assume it means the roof one, which is the only one i'd call manned personally, and then the 2 cheek turrets, which i'd imagine are activated remotely by 2 gunners. Compared to the PDTs on the rear which would be self-sufficient.

-edit 2-

further to that, the stats page lists 5 guns in total. Here are where we know guns exist

Roof

Left Cheek

Right Cheek

Left Rear

Right Rear

What CIG consider manned turrets and unmanned is debatable, but they have mentioned adding 2 PDT's to the rear, to compliment the 3 on the front.

[GeraldEvans]

I'd like to see some type of verification on this from CIG. Maybe that question needs to be in the Q/A  I had hoped they were PDTs but the Freelancer only lists the tail and it has the same cheek guns, which the solo pilot in the Freelancer commercial operated.

[PaulC2K]

I've just tried looking through the SC Dev tracker, nothing.

Then i googled 'Star Citizen Starfarer point defence turret' and found this:

 

The rear guns are point defense turrets. automatic missile defense for the win!

:D

Im determined to find an official source, a developer posted in the RSI forums to mention they'd added 2 rear guns, so i'm hoping a little more clarification is given within their post.

[PaulC2K]

Checked the Ship Stats page

Freelancer:
Unmanned Turret: 2x S2 - 2x FL33 (4)

Manned Turret: 1x S1 2x V82-FL (1)

Count = 3

Starfarer:

Unmanned Turret: 2x S5 - 4x FL33 (4)

Manned Turret: 2x S4 - 4x CF-117 Badger (2) and 1x S5 - 2x CF-337 Rhino (4)
Count = 5
 

Both seem to have these FL33 'unmanned turrets'. That must be cheek guns on both ships? I cant really understand why one is 2x and the other is 4x though.
If so, then the cheek turrets are automated PDT's? The rearward ones are remotely operated 'manned' turrets?


@LtChard
Yeah, I actually found a quote from Ben on the matter of the action seats:

 

The Starfarer doesn't need seven positions to operate, it is designed to be operated by two. A number of additional seats have been added for Squadron 42, but you will not be required to use them. The additional jobs (co-pilot, captain, engineer, additional turret gunners) are all roles "split" from the original two... there shouldn't be a strong need for a Starfarer crew to have both a pilot, co-pilot and engineer.

https://forums.robertsspaceindustries.com/discussion/comment/3994821/#Comment_3994821

It seems they consider 'additional turret gunners' are optional, i'd kinda argue that everyone except a pilot could be considered optional if you really wanted to strip down that far. A pilot and 1 gunner cant operate everything. The pilot can deal with scanner, comms etc, but 3 manned turrets cant be occupied by 2 people.

I still think 5 is the ideal number, but i think anyone contemplating melting a Starfarer because the new stats say 7 (seems 7 has been known since December at least) would be wise to just hold off and see.

[FoxChard]

I think Paul has got it.  Remote manned-which actually makes a lot more sense gamewise.  You could blank out your helmet HUD and use it as a virtual reality display (I'm talking about what you would perceive through your computer monitor).  This model would then allow you to move the turret like you were in it, as if it were manned. 

 

Cheek guns are the FL33s.

[Siberz4]

Good discussions here!

[GeraldEvans]

Yep. I'm really curious what the Q/A will bear out. I had originally assumed the rear turrets were PDTs because short of a jeffries tube I didn't see how anyone would get there. And that's a long crawl.

 

With the new specs saying three manned turrets I'm stumped.  I like Paul's idea that the sides can either be slewed forward or operated in a hemisphere by (a) gunner(s) in the rear seat. That would explain why the latest cockpit art showed hologlobes at the rear seats. Except that they've said camera views don't work well with CryEngine. So the hologlobe wouldn't be helpful with a remoted view and wouldn't be visible with a helmet-projected remote view.

[PaulC2K]

Thats something i really hadnt thought about. I'd been thinking any remotely operated weapons we'd see from a computer screen or something like that, a bit like operating a military drone. But, like you say, they've said the CryEngine doesnt do the picture in picture stuff well, which is essentially what this would be. I guess this also applies to things like seeing security cameras when planetside (assuming they werent fake footage).

I wonder if they could black-out the HUD and project in the remote feed - it makes for a clearer image and its no longer 2 pictures (reality + camera feed) but just the one.
edit: and now ive just realised ive basically described what i'd read @LtChard already said, essentially word for word, as if it hadnt already been mentioned.
 
Most games would simply disconnect you from the regular view and put you into a full-screen the in-game LCD display. Somehow i cant imagine CIG would want to do this, and i'd imagine that the way we see mobiglas through the HUD would be how they'd do the majority of stuff like this, but it sounds unlikely to work for the PiP stuff, unless you block/black out the real world and log into the other viewpoint.

I dont recall reading or seeing anything that specifically said they'd do remotely operated turrets, but the Starfarer, and plenty of other ships, have turrets which dont have seats within them, and they'd need to be operated some how (discounting fixed and nose turret types the pilot can control).

Helmet black-out, and switching to MobiGlas feed seems like the only option - with action seats being local access points to any possible feeds. It wouldnt surprise me if this is their solution, if they're doing remote op weapons.

[FoxChard]

I'm epic like that.  

 

They have a mechanism for this-the SimPod.  We could just wear a special gunner's helmet (aka...a VR headset) which would act like the SimPod and presto, no need for any weird overlays.  Your gunner's would just look hilarious though, moving their head around (because Track IR) and shouting Pew Pew! (because Voice Attack).  Hi-larious.

[GeraldEvans]

I think it would be really awesome to have a remoted gimbaled seat on the bridge. There's no reason to have direct view turrets and if anything they're riskier for the gunner.

 

Put them in a gyroscopic seat with a helmet that projects their view as the gunner. As long as they can't see anything else (a la sim pod) we don't have to worry about camera views.

[FoxChard]

The key thing is that they need to be fully visible looking ridiculous (like Luke Skywalker in the blast shield training helmet) flailing around.  

 

But back to topic: we get not one, but THREEVE Three! Q&A posts this week!

[GeraldEvans]

[Gremlich]

just sayin'

 

we have this:

 

 

 

and what about six of THESE dambuster sized bombs:

 

[GeraldEvans]

You're thinking we should use the starfarer to go dam busting?

 

[Gremlich]

You're thinking we should use the starfarer to go dam busting?

 

asteroid hangars

[Osclin]

To hell with dam busting, if they allow us to use the starfarer for the various fuels that the PU will ostensibly need then we could partake in planet busting.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but haven't they said that there will be different types of powerplants?  Including antimatter?...  If you thought diving into the atmosphere of a gas giant was exciting, imagine the tension surrounding harvesting antimatter(however the hell that would be accomplished...tractor beams and magnetic containment pods?) not to mention transporting it.  Imagine the poor sucker pirates who get a little too trigger happy when attacking a antimatter hauler; straight to permadeath, inform the next of kin.

 

I know that we'll be harvesting hydrogen from the gas giants, and I've always assumed that we'd be using it as reaction mass for our ships' ion-esque drives(admittedly massively more powerful than scientifically feasible).  Assuming that is true, do you think they'll let us process out the deuterium and tritium to sell as fuel for fusion reactors?  Would definitely make harvesting a more valuable occupation.

[GeraldEvans]

I'm going to use the tritium to make my own night sights!

As for can we do it? Suggest it to the designers!

[FoxChard]

Q&A 1 is up, they've definitively stated that we get more maneuverability and cargo space (external AND internal) on the base variant made by MISC.  The internal bay may be large enough for a Greycat, but for all of the random people who are obsessed with mounting snub fighters on everything-those were ruled out because the fighter pod most likely won't fit at the moment. 

 

That'll fit in my Asteroid Hanger!     

 

EDIT: I'll probably find a way to get it in...but how will I get it out?  I'm going to predict a minor $***storm on the RSI forum about it if ever appears hanger ready.