https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/451274

This thread has a lot of useful information regarding AI. The best I have seen.

Well, thanks for the link.  I read through the post and did get some good info about other things, but it seems as though maybe the pirates operate differently from other AIs as far as research goes?  I've gone so far as to eliminate all other researches from their player table and left only mine, but they're still not researching it.  Best I can guess (unless someone else has successfully added a research for pirates) is that they are 100% hard-coded.

The research was a copy of the Advent's "Mass Transcendence" research, which was supposed to allow for auto-experience gain for Capital ships to a cap.  I did my best to eliminate pre-reqs and decreased the costs to just about nothing (not sure if putting it to 0 will actually still get researched) and mirrored other pirate researches for other settings.  Maybe someone can see something wrong in the file itself (it's not long)?

TXT
entityType "ResearchSubject"
hudIcon "HUDICON_RESEARCHSUBJECT_CONSTANTEXPERIENCE"
smallHudIcon "HUDICON_RESEARCHSUBJECT_CONSTANTEXPERIENCE"
infoCardIcon ""
NameStringID "IDS_RESEARCHSUBJECT_CONSTANTEXPERIENCE_NAME"
DescriptionStringID "IDS_RESEARCHSUBJECT_CONSTANTEXPERIENCE_DESCRIPTION"
researchWindowLocation
    block 1
    pos [ 1 , 0 ]
ResearchField "Combat"
Prerequisites
    NumResearchPrerequisites 0
    RequiredFactionNameID ""
    RequiredCompletedResearchSubjects 0
MinimumArtifactLevel -1
BaseUpgradeTime 1.000000
PerLevelUpgradeTime 1.000000
BaseCost
    credits 1.000000
    metal 0.000000
    crystal 0.000000
PerLevelCostIncrease
    credits 250.000000
    metal 0.000000
    crystal 0.000000
Tier 1
onlyWorksIfTierLabsExist FALSE
MaxNumResearchLevels 1
priority 100.000000
researchBoolModifiers 0
researchFloatModifiers 3
researchModifier
    modifierType "ExperienceConstantGainRate"
    baseValue 0.000000
    perLevelValue 1.000000
researchModifier
    modifierType "ExperienceConstantGainLevelCap"
    baseValue 0.000000
    perLevelValue 2.000000
researchModifier
    modifierType "ExperienceAwardedAdjustment"
    baseValue 0.000000
    perLevelValue 0.250000
artifactPicture ""
uniqueOverlayBrush ""
dlcId 204880

*sigh*  Thanks.  Yeah, I hope they get that fixed, too.  Little silly to add researches for something then never actually have it work....

Thanks for the additional input, Lavo.  Would you happen to know off hand if the Pirates are hard-coded on what researches they do, or if new researches added in will work?  I suppose for now it's kind of a moot point... I altered some of their existing researches to include my changes, but it's a lot more difficult to tell if that is working right like that....

I can assure you Pirates USED to research back in the first few patches of Diplomacy. They would get fully decked out with the HP of capitalships, unlockable special abilities, and all sorts of extra stuff. IIRC they do not research things like normal players do however, but they get research whenever they raid players. Or at least they used to, that may have been stopped because they were too OP. 

Thanks for the additional input.

I have since noticed that my value I set for the ExperienceConstantGainRate wasn't as high as it was supposed to be (1 vs 100).  Should've made it so they were level 2s before they even left their own grav well.  But I had observed one raid that went out against an AI player that then returned some time later (assuming "successful" raid) and the solo Cap ship that was apart of that group was still a level 1.

Either way, at some point I'll give this another go.  Working on a separate part of my "pirate" mod right now, so once I have that working to satisfaction I'll move back onto this.

Havent messed with the dev.exe in regards to this but I do see the stats of the pirate ships climb as per the research in which they receive from the base game. You can watch as each pirate ship climbs in weapons, armor and hp.

I wrote first Email to the developers and wrote that pirates don't research. It came fast an answer and they said they do research when player give them money. Then I made a screenshot and showed that they don't research any even if they have money. After this I didn't get any answer.

So... lol  More testing done.

They are researching.  Gepard67, I do not know why, but the dev.exe does not keep track of their credits spent on research, but if you watch their "live" cash flow, you'll see it drop each time a pirate raid spawns and then their stats will adjust, depending on what research they did.

Further, I have been able to test (more so for my own peace of mind) that what bonuses they're getting for the researches are not hard coded somewhere.  I adjusted some of the research stats to ludicrous amounts and saw the appropriate changes on their ships when that research was hit.

So, that means they are researching my modified researches with the ExperienceConstantGainRate and ExperienceConstantGainLevelCap.  It's just that, for whatever reason, they're not taking affect....

EDIT: Ran one last set of tests.  I can verify that pirates do research added researches as well, and that at least the ExperienceAwardedAdjustment affect does work.  As much as I hate having to rely solely on that (as a grav well defended by a Starbase and turrets/hangers won't yield much for experience right off to level the Cap ships up), it may be what I have to do.

Essentially, the whole point behind my trying to do all of that was because level 1 Cap ships are generally push overs... especially vers Starbases.  So I didn't want the Cap ships that will be coming with later pirate raids to be (essentially) free xp to any Capital ships or Titans in the same grav well as a Starbase that just chews them up on entry....