Starfield: How to recruit crew members? Starfield guide, tips

In Starfield, you can recruit crew members and from this guide you will learn where to look for potential candidates. We also tell you how to choose the best crew members, how to lower their financial demands and how to permanently increase your crew limit.

Last update: 31 August 2023

Starfield lets you to recruit crew members who can stay on the ship or in built outposts. In our guide, you will find tips on where to look for candidates, how to hire crew, how to negotiate terms and recruit new characters cheaper, as well as how to increase the crew member limit in a ship.

• Where to look for crew members?
• How to recruit a potential candidate?
• Best crew member - examples
• How to increase the maximum crew limit of a ship?

Where to look for crew members?

You can look for potential crew members in various locations, but you have the best chance by visiting bars in selected cities or bases. Example locations from the first few hours of the game are:

1. The Viewport Bar in New Atlantis - you will find it on the left side when you move away from the landing area.
2. Broken Spear Bar in Cydonia - upon entering the base on Mars, the bar will be on the right in the first corridor.

1. After entering a bar, look for unique named NPCs - those with a first and last name or the "specialist" in their name. During the conversation, you may find out that they are looking for work.
2. The candidate's skills are displayed in the top right corner of the screen. Thanks to this, you can assess the usefulness of a given character. Some skills will be better utilized in a ship (for example, increasing the maximum range), and others will be more useful in outposts (e.g. higher profits from that outpost).

How to recruit a potential candidate?

You have 2 options for most candidates:

1. Paying the full rate - The more qualified a person is, the more credits they will want. Specialists with several or more advanced skills may demand over 10,000 credits.
2. Using persuasion to negotiate a lower rate - A successful persuasion should lower the employee's demands by 50%. Even if you refuse now, the negotiated pay will remain in the next conversation.

1. Each newly recruited crew member must be assigned to your ship or to the outpost you have built. The game will also remind you of their skills, so you can quickly determine where they will be most useful at any given moment.
2. This mechanism works both ways - you can also remove assignments if you want to assign someone else or give a specific crew member a new duty.

Best crew member - examples

Marika Boros is in Viewport in New Atlantis. You can hire her for 12,000 credits (or 6,000 after successful persuasion). Her skills are:

1. Shotgun Certification
2. Ballistics (rank 2)
3. Particle Beam Weapon Systems

Gideon Aker is in Viewport in New Atlantis. You can hire him for 18,000 credits (or 9,000 after successful persuasion). His skills are:

1. Ballistic Weapon Systems (rank 2)
2. Missile Weapon Systems (rank 2)

Simeon Bankowski is in Viewport in New Atlantis. You can hire him for 15,000 credits. His skills are:

1. Sharpshooting
2. Sniper Certification (rank 2)
3. Marksmanship

Andromeda Keppler is in Broken Spear in Cydonia on Mars. You can hire her for 12,000 credits (or 6,000 after successful persuasion). Her skills are:

1. Outpost Engineering (rank 2)
2. Piloting
3. Aneutronic Fusion

How to increase the maximum crew limit of a ship?

1. The game has a limit on the maximum number of active crew members of a ship. You can raise this limit by developing the Ship Command skill. Its first rank increases the limit to 4 people, and the highest rank lets you have up to 8.
2. In addition to skills, you need to have a sufficiently large ship - with enough stations for all crew members and an appropriate number of reactor, engine, shield and weapon modules. You can modify the starting Frontier ship or unlock/purchase a new larger ship.