Pirates = Looters

[RAVEN.myst]

How many people here remember X2's intro movie? Julian and his buddy (I forget his name now, but since I'll be re-playing that one some time very soon, my amnesia is not for long ^^) "stealing a car" from a "parking lot", and getting busted after an intense "car chase scene" - I think piracy ought to include this sort of shenanigans... [Some form of hacking would be used to gain illegal access to other ships docked at a station, for example - and it shouldn't just be a player-doable action, but should occasionally be tried against the player, too - this would add the notion of security upgrades for one's ships and stations, HPD/ISL/AFS for example, and/or others inspired by those three fundamentals.]

[RodentofDoom]

Has it been mentioned somewhere that this time Pirates act like pirate?

Running around destroying everything instead of disable and plunder ain't that sustainable longterm.

Would love to see pirates disable propulsion and shields and com trade ships to drop Cargo instead of going straight for the throat.

wheres the point in them doing that

the majority of pirate patrols are small single man fighters that have zero cargo space, all they can do is leave dropped cargo floating in space.

they cant board tradeships ... because small single man fighters
they cant claim abandoned tradeships ... because small single man fighters

the only marauder style pirates in XR were in Teladi space ... most forum posts regarding the outpost DLC would suggest to egosoft that this is NOT what players want from pirates

[Alith-Ahnar]

Has it been mentioned somewhere that this time Pirates act like pirate?

Running around destroying everything instead of disable and plunder ain't that sustainable longterm.

Would love to see pirates disable propulsion and shields and com trade ships to drop Cargo instead of going straight for the throat.

wheres the point in them doing that

the majority of pirate patrols are small single man fighters that have zero cargo space, all they can do is leave dropped cargo floating in space

they cant board tradeships ... because small single man fighters
they cant claim abandoned tradeships ... because small single man fighters

Thank you for pointing out where the limitation with the current iterations behavior is.

the only marauder style pirates in XR were in Teladi space ... most forum posts regarding the outpost DLC would suggest to egosoft that this is NOT what players want from pirates

Incomplete assessment i would say.
The general dislike did stem from the fact how those Super Smash Pirates interacted with the universe.

Shooting sitting ducks at the Undock or transports that circle the Station for hours at end because they can't find a docking clamp that is free because of reasons certainly did not help to make em fun to have.

Also the total in ability of something remote of a Teladi Security Force to handle those said Pirates around any Station in the DLC Space did not help either.

Yes that's why i asked if there is any changes to how Pirates operate in X4 and if yes are somewhere infos to find how those manifest.

[Sandalpocalypse]

I'm under the impression that the feature was ported over to pirate ships with cargobays in other parts the galaxy later on (4.0?). Having said that, looking back at the changelogs I can't see a related entry so I'm not entirely sure now.

yes, pirate patrols will destroy freighters then pick up their cargos in XR

[Vandragorax]

If uncooperative, marines could be usable to free some cargo from the uncooperative captain - which would likely be much easier than just boarding the ship outright.

Nice idea. Marines cut their way through the hull into the cargobay - only a single deck/round of combat (depending on whether we're comparing to X3TC/AP or XR) is needed, to secure that immediate area; the marines hack an airlock/loading bay which is now accessible (they are inside) and not very hard (they are INSIDE - it's locked to keep people OUT, right?); they un-secure some cargo and toss it out that airlock/loading bay, then follow it out. Expands the functionality of an existing set-piece (the marines) without adding entire new elements/set-pieces - depth/quality over breadth/quantity of expansion.

I like this idea too Expand the use for the "boarding" system with marines having other tasks besides just capture. This has good scope for improvements.

[RAVEN.myst]

Expand the use for the "boarding" system with marines having other tasks besides just capture. This has good scope for improvements.

And while we're at it, why not have (MAJOR) marine invasions with a view to raiding [*], sabotaging [**], or even capturing a station? (Yes, much more ambitious, but ultimately a station is simply another player/NPC-owned asset.) This could (and in my opinion SHOULD) involve a heavy investment in manpower and resources, with lots of planning and complex execution. There should be scope for lots of preparatory measures that could be taken to make the task more achievable. Also, let's not forget consequences... I think that capturing a station would piss off not only its owning faction, but also that faction's trade partners and allies, all of which would take a VERY dim view of this, while that faction's enemies would greatly approve of such a highly visible blow to their rival/enemy. (There are other implication I can think of, but not really relevant to "marines could also be allowed to do [X]")


[*] Raiding could be for a number of objectives: stealing a prototype (piece of equipment or ship) or wares in general; to access information on the station's computer; to rescue, extradite or kidnap a character; to assassinate a character; to plant a spy...

[**] Sabotage could have various degrees and specific applications, including: planting malware in the station computer; deleting or corrupting or altering routing and trade information, thus disrupting the station's trade activities; causing physical damage to systems, in order to either weaken defenses or disrupt production; introduce a pathogen to infect the populace; destroy or otherwise undermine ships docked at the station; destroy the station altogether.

[ADMNtek]

Marine assisted cargo stealing very cool idea. while we are at it what about using marines to sabotage/destroy ships. sent in a small team to plant charges and bail.

[Falcrack]

Pirates should, IMO, be more cowardly than they have in past games. They should attempt, whenever possible, to confine their activities well away from any serious security forces. When faced with a superior or even equal force, they should flee. They should attempt to preserve their lives rather than heroically sacrifice them for a few scraps of cargo.

[RAVEN.myst]

Pirates should, IMO, be more cowardly than they have in past games. They should attempt, whenever possible, to confine their activities well away from any serious security forces. When faced with a superior or even equal force, they should flee. They should attempt to preserve their lives rather than heroically sacrifice them for a few scraps of cargo.

Absolutely! At present and in the past, they've acted more like religious fanatic terrorists, than like pirates, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense - after all, they presumably chose their way of life because they are in it for their own gain and don't care if it comes at others' expense (or even prefer it, among the more sadistic), and wanted easier money than is to be had through honest endeavours - so they ought to be preying on those they perceive as weak but lucrative, targets of opportunity (ever heard of robbers hold up a police station? I mean other than in something like 24...) This could also provide interesting gameplay opportunities if couple with identity-masking or similar: just as described in the encyclopaedia entry for the Stromvok frigate, which looks very similar to the Styrvok freighter, players could set honey-traps - or conversely become the victims of same.

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

Pirates should, IMO, be more cowardly than they have in past games. They should attempt, whenever possible, to confine their activities well away from any serious security forces. When faced with a superior or even equal force, they should flee. They should attempt to preserve their lives rather than heroically sacrifice them for a few scraps of cargo.

Absolutely!

Please see this recent feedback request from Egosoft on the XR flee mechanic.

As things stand in the XR 4.21 beta, I ships aim to do the following:

1. If a ship comes under attack while not following a Fight order, the potential to flee is available.

2. If a ship purposefully attacks something (not just shooting as they fly past), they will do so until either of them dies. This applies to NPCs and our ships. E.g. our ships will do what they're told, and we have orders like "Withdraw from battle" for overriding.

3. If a ship destroys what they started to attack, the potential to flee becomes unlocked again. So If they're under attack from other ships, the initial attacker has the potential to flee.

XR 4.21 is still in beta and feedback to Egosoft in that thread will still be useful. There's still the potential for the code to be altered in response to feedback. Also in response to testing the beta - we need to help confirm whether intended behaviour on paper is working in-game (both in terms of without bugs and in a way that is fun to experience).

[BGrey]

XR pirates stop to collect the loot of their victims so I'd imagine that X4 will have improvements over the purely homicidal approach X3 too.

Have you observed this happening? I do remember the introduction of move.plunder, but sadly I still only ever see "Marauder" ships spawn 20km out from a station and feed themselves to the targon tracers. To know the plundering is happening as intended somewhere would make me very pleased.

I did see this happening in Albion/Ascendancy in the zone with the capital shipyard, can't recall the name. A Rahanas was collecting cargo containers from another dead capital. They also have a warehouse so I assume they bring loot there?

I was trying to repair my standings with the sovereign syndicate to check but doing several of their missions hasn't moved my standing from -26, is it not possible?

I was glad to see this behavior and the warehouse added as it gave them a bit more life beyond suicide into station guns, even if that seems to be their main purpose still. I hope x4 can give them a bit more meaning.

[Earth Ultimatum IV.]

Pirates in rebirth definitely do steal wares, to some degree.

Had a Titurel in Home of Light attacking my miner Midir, before I arrived to help the midir was already dead. Upon my arrival I saw the pirate Titurel with a swarm of Cargolifter drones, picking up the dropped cargo.

Of course, I boarded the titurel and sold it to make up for the loss