From 2.3 plans.

From 2.3 plans.
"The gunner role allows a crewmember to take control of all turreted weapons on the ship. They do not need to jump between turret views though. Using a third person interface, they control a reticule that all turrets within their arc will automatically follow; giving them improved spatial awareness and easy control of all turreted weapons.
Furthermore, the gunner has access to advanced sensor systems, allowing them three hundred and sixty degree tracking arcs. This lets them activate advanced scanners (such as the kill warrant scanner) and missile launchers in any direction."

My reading of this seems to indicate that a multicrew ship in the middle of battle will have spatial awareness advantages way above that of a normal pilot.
Wasn't this the precise reason why we have not had external camera views all this time? I spent a lot of time firing at chasing Thargoids using the rear turret view on the original Elite and even the internal left/right/back views were excluded.

Whan people started making cinematic clips, again we were told that it would upset the fairness of a combat encounter. Of course this sort of consistency with fairness goes out the window anyway once you start using head tracking, so I'm not sure about the consistency of this argument.

Anyway, this is just me being nit-picky I'm sure. I just can't muster any enthusiasm for multicrew / avatars and even the current implementation of multi-ships. Bring on atmospheres or add a amphibious ship for water worlds. dammit even a SRV with more cargo!

Comments

ron d said…
Multi crew ships will have an advantage against single crew regardless of the technical details if and only if the crew coordinates.

However a two person crew can't track and fight against a coordinated 2+ player attack as the turret can only attack one target. They may not have a blind spot but they will have to choose.

However I think this feature would make it that the 2+ crew ships possible without requiring as many players as there are turrets.

It also makes being a gunner less boring because you're not stuck in a single turret during the entire trip.
ron d said…
It will depend on how big those multi-crew ships are when compared to a fighter class ship.
If they are n times bigger then flying multiple ships may give you an advantage.
If however they have more cargo capacity or bigger guns ... it might not be as easy.

There's also the possibility that some people may not want to be a pilot. The game never had an option for that kind of player. It would allow E:D to be an option once Star Citizen is released (if it ever gets finished that is).
ron d said…
Chris Dibben there's always the possibility of tweaks to stats and/or mission parameters that make the choice based on more than mere personal preference.

Example would be a mission that required a single item of cargo that can only fit in a multi crew ship.

There's also the third person view that would give the multi crew ship an advantage over a suadron of ships.

I think it is nice that there will be options for both variants, which should make things more interesting.
I think the ultimate goal for FD was to make the galaxy smaller in regard to friends meeting up and working together in situations. For example I'm near Sag A now but a friend could ask me to man turreted weapons because he's in a bad situation and I could just "be there". There are so many situations like this. I may have someone who wants to telepresense to me just to see Sag A. Easily done. Just my 2 cents but I believe that FD wants to foster more people getting together and enjoying the game together in new ways. I'm all for that but have to agree with much of what is said in this thread. There are so many other things I wanted before this. I'll enjoy it i'm sure but to many of us it just was not as high a priority as some of the other "wish list" items.
Ian Stoffberg said…
Dennis Wronka Wow. Kinda cheapens the work of getting there. If I wanted an instant ride, I'd probably just watch one of your videos! Oh well. To each his own. I'm starting to sound like the grumpy old fart I am.

Popular posts from this blog

Unlocking Hera Tani

So, in the spirit of Elite Stories, thought I'd share my perspective of last night.