IDEA: Pirates

I got the feeling the were throwing a mass of ships to wreck up the joint and collect the likely massive bounty on your head and fund the further the building of ships to collect more bounties.

I like the idea of Pirates stealing techs from players. Would make them more of a threat. Right now they are pretty easy to mitigate. But maybe more is in store with them later on.

Actualy i didnt have a massive bounty, they tried to pass through one of my systems on the way to somewherre else, and i had to wreck them up because i had a jump inhibitor that they wanted to kill first lol. But that is aside the point, it doesnt make sense for pirates to MASS ATTACK an actual empire.

Pirates are supposed to have a degree of tact and stealth to their actions, not just blunt force raids

I would like to be able to not just place a bounty on someone but also to task the pirates, like 2000 credits to attack a particular system or to have them target just cap ships. This would give them more of a mercenary flavor.

Nah I disagree, because than it will be merc-wars ftw, but I do agree that pirats AI should be tweaked to go more after civilian ships than hard military targets, they are pirats not patriots who fight for thier worlds, they shouldn't wast themselves to kill a star, it will be more annoying if pirat fleets will have somthing like the embargo ability of the sova maybe without the reduction in build time.

That and having pirat ships running all over the map after your trade ships and refinery ships will be most annoying... *evil grin*

Exactly! something to worry about BEHIND your lines!

this would be an EXCELLENT reason to have several smaller fleets rather then one big fleet...

however i do like the idea of putting a bounty on a specific cap ship or somthing... but it would be MUCH more expensive to place such bountys

id also like to understand how the pirate economy works... especially with respect to techs... (wich i agree, they should have to steal)

I HATE hafting to split up my fleet

I LOVE having one giant fleet that steamrolles everything

I HATE it when I am currently pwning someone, and some other weakling comes up behind me with pea-shooters, and takes out three of my planets becouse I put ALL of my reasourecs into one big fleet which can't get ANYWHERE in time to save a planet, or two.

I HATE IT, HATE IT, HATE IT.


which is why better pirates and such should be implemented into to the game to keap ppl like me from getting too cozy with one giant fleet.

I detect a little sarcasm there LOL.

Yes, it's really not that hard managing multiple fleets at once. It takes a small amount of brain matter to figure out the important choke points and such. This isn't C&C, you can't just do a mass tank rush on the enemy and not worry about defending your own planets (well, with the AI's current state, you probably could, but not against an opponent who isn't brain dead.)

I do feel that the Pirate's AI needs to be tweaked. If it enters a system that's heavily defended by one of my main fleets that consists of 3 cap ships, they shouldn't throw themselves against it with a handful of frigates & cruisers. It's tantamount to a swarm of bugs versus a speeding car's windshield. If their fleet enters a well defended system, it should either retreat back out and try another way, or try to do a blockade run to get to a nearby system.

Personally, I'm fine with how the Pirates act now, it's the name for them that bugs me. If they renamed it to Mercenaries then it would make a lot more sense. Mercenaries would still go after a bounty on a nation, and would want to mass attack just to mess up a system however they wanted.

I like this idea for pirates.


Not only would this make them MORE like pirates but it would also stop the pirates from doing the one thing they do now which i think actually hurts the game. The early game seems to be about controlling the pirates in your home system. Basically setting up some defenses at whatever system they're likely to come through and then building up a kill fleet to drive them out of your system... at which point there are no pirates in your home system.


Ideally, pirates shouldn't even need the pirate base as pirates pretend to be civilians when not raiding... thus no need really for a pirate base. Pirates should instead be like a defuse insurgency in your empire requiring defenses and counter measures EVERYWHERE because pirates blend in with your own people. Mostly they should be stealing things but you could have them sabotage things for bounty.


I also like the idea of them taking over your ships. I think capitalships should be immune to this sort of thing, but smaller ships shouldn't be a problem. When stolen the pirates should run to the star and then phase jump to "nowhere"... basically just disappear from the game map. Then on the diplomacy/stock menu players can "bid" on the ship. You can even bid on your own ship if you like. Winning bidder not only gets the ship but whatever technology was required to make that ship. If you're a different race then either give the race some kind of general upgrade or grant them a similar technology. The idea being that the pirate would want to make as much money off of stealing the ship as possible.

That's how pirates work, they don't come in big waves like a fleet, they're a defuse threat that eats at your boarders... that strikes the unaware, the undefended, and the valuable. Perhaps they steal crystal transports and then sell that on the black market.


Anyway, I love this idea because I really don't like the way pirates work at the moment. I think they take more from the game then they add to it.

the pirates are good the way they are FOR NOW. its really one of the few things the AI has to throw at me that will even up the score. (since i dont waist money on trying to out bounty the AI). it at least keeps me kinda on my toes... but for the future it deffinitly needs to be looked at. id love to see them more spread out attacking multiple targets at once all over my empire.

What if there were civilian ships that werent just frighters? the occational "cruisliner" or "pleasure craft" then make the pirate ships look just like these ships. that way they could sneek a few ships into the heart of your empire and attack were you least expect it with out your parimiter deffenses being trigered?

i went on alot with the cruisliner idea but im just gonna post all that in a different thread keep this one on pirates.

I've gotta disagree about out-bountying being a waste. I use that to a distinct advantage... for the cost of a few light frigates I can bring a world of hurt onto an enemy system and then sneak in after the bounty drops a bit to pick up the pieces. I actually won a game simply through bountying. I was setting up a super fleet to start steamrolling in after an unsuccessful attempt earlier into enemy territory, and then suddenly "All your Enemies Have been Defeated, You are Victorious!" Sorta anti-climatic. Pirates should definately not have nukes... what's the point of destroying the folks whom you want to pay your next bounty anyway?

It does seem like the pirates should be more focused in their goals and in their wanted rewards. Prioritizing commerce ships over thermo-nuclear planetary bombardment for instance.

I love the idea of technology theft, but why not have that ability for players as well? Perhaps an Infiltrator technology/ability to siphon research from enemy installations with a colonization-like raiding technique? You could really mess someone up by killing some important techs. (though perhaps they could cost half the normal time/resources to re-research for the loser of the tech, just so it's not unreasonable... I mean, they DID figure it out once, there's got to be "some" usable information left to build from)

I'm sorry, but the "logic" of removing techs just doesn't make sense. A weapon has been developed, placed into use, and all of a sudden vanishes? Even if you kill key researchers, all you can do is make them redo work that hasn't been placed into production.

Unless the infiltration teams upload viruses to destroy any traces of that technology, they they would have to backwards engineer what they had known from something they have on hand. Thus where the idea of having it quicker and only half priced comes in above?

OR there could be chances involved, the infiltration team gets it and jumps away and the research stays OR the infiltration team fails and the researchers destroy the information before the enemy could get it?

I think it would also be cool for pirates if they would get a capship for their raids in the later part of the game, when they have accumulated enough bounty.
Or maybe a capship or two to defend their base.
Its ridiculously to overtake their base once you have a medium sized fleet and two caps!
They should be a threat through the whole game and not only in the very beginning.

Or just give them incredibly powerful system defenses, like maybe a few gauss cannons that can tear a line frigate apart in one hit that reaches to the jump in point?

A) anyone who doesn't keep backups deserves what happens to them. I sincerely doubt that the "military-industrial complex" doesn't know that rule, in whatever era.
for a virus to pull of what your talking about, you'd also need to not only defeat any electronic defenses, but expose all computer networks to it -- unless they're all connected to one giant internet, the ultimate defense of not being connected should be useful. Again, assuming the people "in charge" have half a brain.
C) Computer viruses can't destroy whats in people's heads. And if the scientists involved don't know the results (not necessarily to the umpteenth digit) something is wrong. Sure, they may have to start "from scratch" but they'll know (in general) where to look, and what roads not to take.

Edit:

Here, an example: imagine, please, trying to take away Aegis combat system from the navy. Ain't going to happen, is it?

And you didnt address my other idea where the researchers do it them selves when they realise they wont be able to stop the pirates?

Because it doesn't make any sense -- how can scientists do it themselves, when they aren't in sole possession of the technology anymore?

I do have to say from a logical stand point, its rather hard to justify stealing a technology meaning that a person loses that tech. I have to agree with Ron that anyone with two brain cells could come up with the idea of back up copies. And even if there is an empire wide internet type thing, a government wouldn't put all its information soley on the internet system because of that very threat of hacking. Finally, hacking into government files is no mean feat. The US Defense Department for instance has never, as far as I have heard, been hacked into by any private hacker or organization (I'm not sure but I don't think any hackers from other governments have done it either...implanting spies is easier). I would assume that technologies for future empires would be equivalently protected.

Hrm, wasn't the DoD (and many other agencies internationally) hacked a while back?

While industrial espionage is an everyday thing there is no way somebody's technology could just be stolen and he wouldn't have it anymore. The prerequisites for such a feat are so finely tuned it's just not worth looking into. FOr starters there should be no patent made and somebody would have to take ALL the existing plans (which is not a single map or something for high-tech equipment and it's never all in one place), grab ALL the scientists working on the project and so forth... Remember WWII and German rocket and aircraft scientists? They were grabbed from all over Germany by both USA and SU and yet Germany has both missiles and planes. Which I'm sure neither of the powers gave them.

Well, actually the BRD got military support by the USA while the DDR got military support by the Sovjet Union.

Hacking into every system connected to the outside is possible (and has been done to almost all systems). That's why you have physical backups, one-way connected systems, closed systems, etc. Hacking is always possible, but restoring old data is very easy if one is prepared.

I think the Pirates are too weak and should NOT have a planet, too easy to get rid of them!