What is service crew for?

[Rodrigo]

Been buying some fighters with service crew 3/3 or 4/4 but i've no idea what they're for, I thought they had some to do with boarding along marines but I can't sort it out.

[Wraith]

Originally posted by Rodrigo:

Been buying some fighters with service crew 3/3 or 4/4 but i've no idea what they're for, I thought they had some to do with boarding along marines but I can't sort it out.

For S fighters almost nothing.

Though they do contribute to the overall level of the ship which help with the ship performance in combat

[Cellar_Cat]

I think for S ships they are actually just a passenger. For M, L, and XL they improve ship performance and repair.

[=STP= Isegrim]

M,L and XL Ships get repaired by the Servicecrew over time based on their skill level from 50% up to 90% of the Hull.

[Colmaniac]

Mostly for large & massive ships, they help toward repairs and functionality for that ship depending on their skills, smaller ships I just keep a couple in case coming across an abandoned ship.

[zpc]

To add to the other posts: while for S it is not important, for L and XL ships it is vital. This can't be stressed enough - every ship in these classes should have maximum service crew, no matter what. Don't distribute 50:50 for marines or stuff like that. Only your boarding fleet / ship should have marines (and it should only be used for boarding). Every other combat / trading / mining vessel needs the additional servicecrew to operate at peak efficiency.

[Rodrigo]

oh, so its for overall efficiency, ok thanks folks, i'll ignore for S and fill up M and up

[Wraith]

Originally posted by Rodrigo:

oh, so its for overall efficiency, ok thanks folks, i'll ignore for S and fill up M and up

Don’t ignore for S ship

Some crew is better than no crew

As 0 crew contributes nothing to the ship and will leave them never able to reach 5 star overall

So your overall ship level will always be missing some star

[zpc]

Originally posted by Wraith:

Originally posted by Rodrigo:

oh, so its for overall efficiency, ok thanks folks, i'll ignore for S and fill up M and up

Don’t ignore for S ship

Some crew is better than no crew

As 0 crew contributes nothing to the ship and will leave them never able to reach 5 star overall

So your overall ship level will always be missing some star

Right ... and there are also miners / traders in the S class department. Thanks for pointing that out :) (I confess - S ships are mostly consumables in my book -.-)

[markymint]

Yep. Service crew in small ships (with orders of some kind) will level up to 5* engineer very quickly. You could then move them over to your more important ships, etc. For RP I like to think these folks did a fantastic job in the lower ranks - training - so I reward them with a position on the flagship or their own captaincy or sth when they hit 5 stars, as their other attributes will also level up (well, morale at least, management typically requires some piloting but I think even that levels up for service crew). I think of them as expert engineers so I send them off to run the microchips factory and stuff :D But there are definitely some practical reasons to crew ships with them, for those with whom their workforce is simply statistics ;)