Going beyond Ship Command mastery?

[chipartist]

Facing a mega-shoot-out with the Crimson Fleet and with the two specialized modules that mission provides, I upgraded my ship Indigo Nimue from eight to ten active crew slots, but the Ship Command skill that increases the crew limit stops at eight. By un-assigning Andreja (she offers no ship-related skills) I was able to add two more Specialist crew, one for particle weapons and one for ship's Defensive Systems (his skill is in Starship Engineering, though). They helped a great deal (check my new shield rating in pic below). Though my ship can handle two more crew, the only skill I'm aware of that affects crew size has that dang limit of eight. Am I missing an in-game (not modded) solution to this seeming oversight? I can always use more skilled hands on deck.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3154553343
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3154553818

[momopovich]

It seems that some companions don't count towards the cap or bug the thing out. I was able to have 5 crew members without any skill point invested, not sure why. Ship command seems very bugged in various ways.

[alanc9]

Andreja does have Energy Weapon Systems skill. Doesn't help me since I'm strictly using particle beams, but it's there.

AFAIK, there's no point to raising the ship's capacity over eight,

[wtiger27]

Once you have all the skip skills maxed out that you want, the only two crew members which add anything for your ship is Sam Coe ( cargo and engine pip ) and Omari Hassan ( shield pip and shield health ). I checked this out using the console to get the values trying different crew members.

I did not find any crew member which give my ship extra weapon damage. Even if it showed they did by their skill listed. But one thing which will, is the Isolation Skill. The 40% extra damage, will also apply to your ship's weapon damage.

The shield values shown on your ship Chip, is a bugged value. The most you can have, without mods or a console command, is 3200 with Omari on your ship.

But great looking design, which is expected from your designs. :)

[chipartist]

Originally posted by alanc9:

Andreja does have Energy Weapon Systems skill. Doesn't help me since I'm strictly using particle beams, but it's there.

AFAIK, there's no point to raising the ship's capacity over eight,

You're right, I should have said a skill that I can use, as I don't use energy weapons. She's still my main squeeze, though, so she rides everywhere I go.

@wtiger27: Yeah, I figure that huge shield value will not be there when I load the game again. It's such a ridiculous jump from 3200, as the Specialist has only one pip in Starship Engineering, not even in shields like Vasco, But his specialty is Defensive Systems so who am I to argue lol. Going into the Crimson Fleet mission slugfest, it persisted, and in that battle I'll take all the help I can get.

And thank you, the Indigo line is my ultimate ship, gonna keep her or a sister for the rest of this character's universe-jumping lifetime.

[alanc9]

The Reddit folks say that crew skills do stack with the PC's. Never tested it because it's more efficient to put ranks in Ship Command. (I suppose I'd feel differently if I ever got to NG+8 or whatever and had more skill points than I know what to do with, but I ain't doing that )

[chipartist]

The boosted shield value held through the QTD and starting the game up later. However, for no apprent reason both the Specialist crew members I hired were kicked off my ship by the game, even though I have more than enough crew slots for them and have not hijacked any ships with reduced crew count. So we'll see if the shield value continues to be so unusually high next go-round.

[chipartist]

Not sure if it's bugged or what, but that higher shield rating of 3839 is not going away, even after I lost a crew Specialist with shield-related skills. If it is a bug, I don't plan to fix it, it kind of makes up for the other bugs that can weaken your character in one way or another.