Trade Empire-class Commercial Transport

[Spinward Flow]

In my opinion, almost all systems in a futuristic spacecraft will automated and the entire idea of having a human crew doing anything on board other than monitoring and maintenance is a bit silly.

This is almost certainly the better path to be thinking about crew requirements.

The degree of automation is going to be high (pre-Virus ... post-Virus though the levels of automation should come down and the demand for crew to replace the automation should rise). In a highly automated system like that, the crew essentially become Inspectors who need to verify and confirm that the automation is doing the automated tasks correctly. The crew are also responsible for maintenance of the automated systems so they keep working properly.

Or to put it another way, in high technology space craft and starships (meaning TL=9+), the assumption ought to be that the crew are more in the role of "white collar overseers" than they are "blue collar slaves to the machines" (so to speak).

However, an important distinction needs to be made at this point which is not something explicitly spelled out in the Rules As Written, although it is directly implied.

The rules specify the MINIMUM crew numbers ... not the maximum.
It is perfectly possible (for various and sundry reasons) to have a campaign setting where the "minimum crew" specified by the ship design rules are considered "inadequate" to the way ships "work" in that specific setting. The Virus Era being a prime example of a condition in which having too much automation allowing low crew numbers represented an exploitable weakness, making a ship ripe for infection and compromise. Increase the number of crew so as to reduce the degree of automation and you can potentially "harden" a ship's operations against the risk of computer infection and reduce the opportunities to be compromised.

In other words ... "excuses" for needing more than minimal crew numbers CAN be justified as a response to something like a perceived threat scenario in a specific setting.

Then when you do a "fish out of water" situation of the excessively crewed ship traveling somewhere else with higher automation and smaller crew sizes, that excessive crew count can start looking out of place and "wasteful" in a different context ... but that's the key, it's a different context.



When the tech gets high enough, a lot of tasks evolve into a case of push (correct) button, (desired) stuff happens ... with the biggest challenge being the need to figure out which button to push to make what you want to have happen take place.

It's when the reliance on that automation becomes a liability because circumstances change that things can start getting really interesting.

 

[whartung]

The rules specify the MINIMUM crew numbers ... not the maximum.

They should be more clear than this. For example, it makes sense to have "1 gunner per battery". This is the guy at the console, finger on the button. We don't really need more than this, as it tends to not be a 24 hour job.

But, say, do the engineering requirements consider the 24 hour nature of operations, at least on a large vessel.

On a small vessel, you just wake the guy up when an alarm goes off or a light turns on or you smell smoke or ozone. On a larger vessel, I assume those crew are there for a reason, and thus the position needs to be staffed 24x7.

Similar for the bridge crew, pretty sure someone needs to be there 24x7. It's not just Han and Chewie playing games back in the lounge while the autopilot does the work.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Similar for the bridge crew, pretty sure someone needs to be there 24x7.

If you can't have people standing watch continuously on rotations, your bridge officers need to be "on call" to scramble and get to the bridge if something happens (with notice given by the automated systems, of course). This becomes more of a problem on ships with smaller crews (like 6-7 and under) where there just aren't enough hands available to stand watch on the bridge in a constant rotation (that only stops when in jump or berthed at a port).

 

[whartung]

Well, crab boats at sea always have someone on duty on the bridge, even if everyone else is sleeping. Sleeping on watch on the bridge brings yelling and screaming from the ships Captain and reduced Pop Tart rations for the duration of the trip.

 

[Independence Games]

This is almost certainly the better path to be thinking about crew requirements.

The degree of automation is going to be high (pre-Virus ... post-Virus though the levels of automation should come down and the demand for crew to replace the automation should rise). In a highly automated system like that, the crew essentially become Inspectors who need to verify and confirm that the automation is doing the automated tasks correctly. The crew are also responsible for maintenance of the automated systems so they keep working properly.

Or to put it another way, in high technology space craft and starships (meaning TL=9+), the assumption ought to be that the crew are more in the role of "white collar overseers" than they are "blue collar slaves to the machines" (so to speak).

You appear to be talking about the OTU. This is Clement Sector.

 

[Spinward Flow]

You appear to be talking about the OTU. This is Clement Sector.

I'm talking in general. Virus is just a convenient example of the kind of rationale for why minimum crew might not work out so well in some settings. Clement Sector will have its own unique flavor and reasoning for why a higher than minimum demanded by the rules crew complement may make sense, creating the large crew ship scenario that you were referencing earlier.

 

[kilemall]

Re: maximum crewing, certainly those missile turrets require just one launcher/director gunner, but some body has to be reloading and others dealing with damage control.

And given the consistently crew destructive effects of all those radiological weapons, having some extras will keep the ship fighting if there isn’t a frozen watch available.