Where to Store Extra Crew? A Barracks Ship?

[Fartikus]

I am working out of an NPC wharf mostly right now, managing my growing flotilla of mini miners and mini traders. Whenever I see a pilot walking around with 2 stars, I immediately hire him. So now I have a small backlog of unassigned 2-star pilots. I've been hotswapping them into service crew on random ships while rotating them into trading ships, but I'm afraid I'm gonna forget about some of them.

How do folks manage their surplus, more valuable crew? Is there a place where you can store them? I was thinking about buying a high-crew ship a the NPC wharf and keeping it as a "barracks ship", but before I do that I was wondering if there is something else I can do.

[Xenomorph]

Some ppl say that idle NPC can lose stats (like morale), if that matters. Someone else might be able to clarify this.
On the topic, no, there is nothing else you can do but leave them on a ship somewhere.

[Bozz 💀]

I have several shuyaku transporters with hundreds of crew members, they loose experiance extremelly slowly ! but I lost 4 of my ships in an invasion I did not pay attention and they were destroyed that kinda sucked but it's my fault should have docked those ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ !

[HoloByteus]

I keep all my Argonian slaves in habitats, might as well get some work out of them. I call it Rura Pita.

[Fartikus]

Is that like Rura Penthe?

[Sticky]

Originally posted by Fartikus:

I am working out of an NPC wharf mostly right now, managing my growing flotilla of mini miners and mini traders. Whenever I see a pilot walking around with 2 stars, I immediately hire him. So now I have a small backlog of unassigned 2-star pilots. I've been hotswapping them into service crew on random ships while rotating them into trading ships, but I'm afraid I'm gonna forget about some of them.

How do folks manage their surplus, more valuable crew? Is there a place where you can store them? I was thinking about buying a high-crew ship a the NPC wharf and keeping it as a "barracks ship", but before I do that I was wondering if there is something else I can do.

I recommend buying a Construction Ship and leave room for your extra Crew. Also Construction Ships level the crew members faster than anything i seen. Just build some stations with it and swap the leveled crew off the Construction ships onto a ship that you want to have an experienced crew. Fastest way to level your Engineers.

[HoloByteus]

Originally posted by Fartikus:

Is that like Rura Penthe?

That's just a mine, we make lots of things at RiP as it's affectionately known.

[Sticky]

Originally posted by Xenomorph:

Some ppl say that idle NPC can lose stats (like morale), if that matters. Someone else might be able to clarify this.
On the topic, no, there is nothing else you can do but leave them on a ship somewhere.

Morale matters, its a multiplier for the Captains Skills, Even the experienced Crew stats help the Captains.

[Chris]

The strategy that I've been using is to stick all my "interesting" crew in to a captured Supply Ship (Monitor) as support crew & then set that ship to trade things between the ANT trade station in The Void & the ANT shipyard. This causes the vessel to pass through a "dangerous region" radiation belt during each leg of the journey, which then levels up the Engineering trait of the crew members. I've now got almost an entire ship full of 5 star engineers, ready to be swapped in to other ships as needed.
I then tend to use captured Minotaurs as crew shuttles between my resupply ship & wherever I actually want them.

[Fartikus]

Jesus, 100 crew? I've got less than 50 hours in and haven't build a large ship yet. I was thinking more like a ship that could hold 12+ crew in it. Yesterday, I picked up the highest crewed medium ship I could find (some kind of transport I think) and started stuffing people into it.

But after reading this discussion, I am now concerned about the rumoured skill decay from leaving people in docked ships.

Is skill decay a confirmed feature for docked ships? If so, I need to figure out what to do. It would be terribly inefficient and micromanaging to park a barracks ship in space, and then periodically "shuttle" newly hired crew back/forth from the NPC wharf. That sounds hideous. Hoping for a better way to do this.

[Wraith]

There no skill decay.
Just a chance for morale to drop if your ships aren't doing anything and for engineers and crew it not bad at all since they level up like no tomorrow.

[Fartikus]

Does anyone know what S-class ship has the largest crew complement? I haven't seen anything with a crew size more than 4. I'm asking cuz I'm finding craploads of 2 and 3-star pilots walking around these teeny 1M stations, and I want to park a "recruiting shuttle" at them. It has to be a small ship, 'cuz the flipping stations only have 1 medium dock. Every time I bring in my barracks ship to dock, it gets immediately shunted to internal storage, which is a PITA to micromanage.

[Sticky]

Look for your answer in S Freighters and not the Fighters for Larger crew capacity. Get your own stations for Free Crew Members.

[ale]

I think the magpie or the curier can have 8 crew. Don't remember which one

[Sticky]

Your Close but its 6, also keep in mind that the same race but different faction may have a ship with different Specs.

[Fartikus]

ah cool, found a few 6-man small ships. Thanks.