Subset Games Forum

So I'm trying to figure out what actions precisely are giving crew member experience. I haven't yet done actual experiments as such since the interface is a little tricky, but I think:

Each instance of a dodged shot gives pilot and engine experience
Each fired shot that was time-reduced by a gunner gives gunner experience
Each shield restoration time-reduced by a crew member gives shield experience
Each bar (?) of repaired systems gives repair xp (how does this apply to breaches?)
Each enemy killed gives the last person to hit it the combat XP.

This begs the question: is it possible to game the system by sitting in an asteroid belt and just taking shots/dodging to build shields/engine? And is combat xp just a load of crap, especially when you spend most of your time venting the ship?

Combat xp is key to an effective boarding strategy.
If you could "game" the system, it would only be "gaming" in a sense- sitting in an asteroid field getting pelted sounds more like a dangerous-yet-viable training method for pilots rather than an exploit.

Yeah, I remember someone saying how they gamed the system like that against a weak opponent ship. The ship didn't have enough firepower to down their shields, and also had some shields of its own. So they just left one of their guns on autofire and went and did something else for a while. Came back, heaps of experience. No danger or risk at all.

I also remember the devs saying they wanted to revamp the experience system if they get time.

Sitting in an asteroid field doesn't work. You need to be in combat with another ship to gain experience from pilot engine and shields.
The weak opponent that can't pierce your shields works though. (I leveled up piloting, engines, shields and weapons on each member of my entire crew once just to try it out.)

Breaches does not give experience to repair skill. I don't know if they should, but my guys did not get any exp when I checked it.

You also get combat xp for destroying enemy systems. I think it works the same way as repairing, where each bar knocked off the system gives you xp.

Jintor wrote: Each instance of a dodged shot gives pilot and engine experience
Each fired shot that was time-reduced by a gunner gives gunner experience
Each shield restoration time-reduced by a crew member gives shield experience
Each bar (?) of repaired systems gives repair xp (how does this apply to breaches?)
Each enemy killed gives the last person to hit it the combat XP.

A few others in this thread have handled answered most of the questions, but my experimentation with the game has shown me the following. Keep in mind that, except for Repairs and Combat, these can only increase when fighting another ship (which is pretty much when there is an enemy ship taking up the right-half of the screen):

1. Piloting and Engines: Piloting and Engines XP is gained from dodging a shot from any weapon that can be dodged. However, if your ship is cloaked your Pilot and Engie crewmember will NOT gain XP for dodging shots.

2. Gunnery: The gunner only needs to be at the terminal at the moment the weapon is fired to gain the XP. You can have your expert gunner recharge the weapon at his quickened pace and then swap to a newbie gunner when it is time to fire the shot. In this scenario, the newbie gunner (who is at the terminal when the weapon is fired) gains the experience, not the expert gunner!

3. Shields: Yup. Anytime the shield recharges itself by one point for whatever reason your crew member at the Shields terminal gains 1 XP. You can flip shields off and back on in battle and gain XP that way too! Sitting in an asteroid field outside of combat won't gain you Shields XP.

4. Repairs: XP behaves just like Combat XP. The person who is the last to "fix" one bar of damage gains the XP. It's rough to tell who will be the last person to "fix" the system, so if you are focusing on training up a crew member (especially with Mantis men), you'll want to move the other crew members away from fixing the system right before the yellow repair bar completes. Fixing breaches or putting out fires does not give your crew members Repair XP.

5. Combat: Pretty much what you wrote. Applies to both organic and boarding drones. Your crew members will also gain XP for each bar of damage done to an enemy system.

Well, if the devs are probably going to revamp the xp system, how do you think that will work out? Some kind of time-spent system instead?

I hope they don't rework it- it's just fine right now, and I don't think most players even try to exploit the system.

Firefighting needs to be a gorram skill.

Gorram FIRE