Weapon for Traders...

[Mortifa]

So we have drones, really cool.

How about a little payback for traders?

Design a pseudo-drone that can imitate drop cargo but once on board a pirate, or interdicting, ship can be detonated by the trader?

The way I would work it is you have trap drones, you have to set as many as you like when you take on your cargo, they are stealthy and when scanned appear as regular cargo. But if you plan on ejecting one or so, you have to program them before you leave the station, because other wise they appear as mines when jettisoned. When you program them they can be set for their target type, such as cargo hatch, weapons, and such. They should be configured so that if they target the power plant an exceptional roll would take out the ship.

Be a lot of fun to trigger that just before you hit jump...

 

[geoffrey.hdt]

So...you want to implement a way 100% sure to kill real pirates?
And you find this funny?

OK, here is one for you: a pirate and a griefer, who are both craving for PvP, are on a boat. One is there for your cargo, the other wants you dead for fun. You push the pirate out from the boat, who is left?

 

[Killakiwi]

How about a tracker?, You buy tracker that scans as a normal piece of cargo but makes the Pirate visible to you on the galaxy map for the next 1-24 hours depending on the cost of the tracking device.

 

[IronGremlin]

The "physical" power dynamic between traders and pirates needs to favor pirates in order for piracy to be a valid career path.

Giving traders a way to effectively, directly retaliate against piracy is just going to discourage people from being pirates altogether.

More interesting would be a better system for transferring cargo between ships - this could take time, during which the trader could try to stall, and covertly get outside help.

This would introduce a dynamic that doesn't directly favor either side of the conflict, but gives both parties a more interesting and engaging interaction in which they both have opportunity to gain the upper hand.

 

[shadragon]

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=104911

Didn't go over well when I suggested it.

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

No. Pirates have so many problems to deal with while traders have very little.

Just because traders do not see the effects that berate a pirate, it does not mean they do not exist. We have to worry about security levels, bounty hunters, being scanned, other players, and more. So many times have I lost most of the cargo I pirated because the police appeared quite too early.

Traders need to submit and boost, and when faced with a pirate, drop some cargo. Or, if you don't want to drop some cargo, you could use countermeasures, shield boosters, use silent running and heat sinks, spend money on good thrusters, fly through high-security systems... You have it extremely easy.

Piracy is the hardest role in the game by a long shot, and there is no reason to give traders any more of an advantage.

 

[Jaeger]

So...you want to implement a way 100% sure to kill real pirates?
And you find this funny?

OK, here is one for you: a pirate and a griefer, who are both craving for PvP, are on a boat. One is there for your cargo, the other wants you dead for fun. You push the pirate out from the boat, who is left?

Wow this analogy really shows how the game is designed to victimize traders no matter what..

What a terrible game.

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

How about a tracker?, You buy tracker that scans as a normal piece of cargo but makes the Pirate visible to you on the galaxy map for the next 1-24 hours depending on the cost of the tracking device.

So the trader could come back in his FdL and murder me, without me being able to escape under his nose? No.

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

Terrible idea op, we don't need a trader I win button.

How about a tracker?, You buy tracker that scans as a normal piece of cargo but makes the Pirate visible to you on the galaxy map for the next 1-24 hours depending on the cost of the tracking device.

Now this is a good idea, it allows a trader to seek revenge or round up a wing to kill a nuisance.

 

[Strangepork]

*snif*

And ALL that scooping too ... scoop, scoop, scoop. Scoop

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

Wow this analogy really shows how the game is designed to victimize traders no matter what..

What a terrible game.

Victimize traders? Traders get pirated by pirates, pirates get hunted by bounty hunters, and of course traders can buy combat-ready ships rather than freight trains and fight back.

His point is, if you push the role of piracy out, all of the old pirates won't bend and join the ranks of the traders, they'll start murdering you. I would.

- - - Updated - - -

Now this is a good idea, it allows a trader to seek revenge or round up a wing to kill a nuisance.

I disagree. Pirates would constantly be on the run, and there aren't traders everywhere. We can't run forever, we need to steel within or around a certain system, get some piracy in, survey the local economies, not drop into new systems and start pirating.

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

So the trader could come back in his FdL and murder me, without me being able to escape under his nose? No.

Bah, what kind of pirate are you? Bring on the trader revenge I say.

 

[Jericho]

So...you want to implement a way 100% sure to kill real pirates?
And you find this funny?

OK, here is one for you: a pirate and a griefer, who are both craving for PvP, are on a boat. One is there for your cargo, the other wants you dead for fun. You push the pirate out from the boat, who is left?

I liked that book/movie.

I think for many it wasn't apparent until they saw the movie that the Tiger was actually the boy and visa versa.

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

Bah, what kind of pirate are you? Bring on the trader revenge I say.

Well, I fly a Cobra, and you fly a Clipper. I'd like to fight traders, but the traders that I would be interdicting are naturally going to have so much more cash than me, because they're traders. They're the king of the credit in the game. With that cash, they're going to buy a completely OP ship in comparison to mine, which will eliminate any chance of me escaping and surviving.

I'm not a battle-boat pirate, I use a silver tongue and the darkness of space to get around

 

[HurstLlama]

"Piracy is the hardest role in the game by a long shot..."

That is as maybe, but given Pirates are bunch of rich boys (how else could they have afforded those fancy ships?) doing it for the thrill I am not sure we should feel sorry for them or want to give them any sort of advantage.

The best thing a trader can do when faced by a pirate is to run if possible and self-destruct if it isn't. Give them nothing.

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

I disagree. Pirates would constantly be on the run, and there aren't traders everywhere. We can't run forever, we need to steel within or around a certain system, get some piracy in, survey the local economies, not drop into new systems and start pirating.

Well he didn't say forever, just a temporary thing. A few hours or until you sell the tagged cargo would be fine. Also If it takes up cargo space not many traders will use it anyway. It won't be commonly used.

Edit:

I'm not a battle-boat pirate, I use a silver tongue and the darkness of space to get around

My clipper isn't that strong, I struggle against vultures, those things are like little armored wasps. So you might have a better chance than me.

The cobra is the fastest ship in the game, a clipper is the only ship that can even keep up and even then you can still outrun it

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

Well he didn't say forever, just a temporary thing. A few hours or until you sell the tagged cargo would be fine. Also If it takes up cargo space not many traders will use it anyway. It won't be commonly used.

Oh, I forget that the tracker would be in the cargo and not on the ship. Durr.

 

[Monk]

As a player who mostly trades...

I feel lone traders should be pretty close to completely helpless against a moderately equipped pirate. I would go so far as even giving pirates a SC disruption missile that would disable FSD even longer than the cool down.

This is coming from my experience as a trader on Discovery mod Freelancer where pirates had a lot of control over lone traders. However, that is balanced by the superb profits of large scale trade ships. We have the large scale trade ships in ED, still just missing the pirate part.

If you don't bring an escort, then bring enough to pay the toll.

 

[geoffrey.hdt]

No. Pirates have so many problems to deal with while traders have very little.

Just because traders do not see the effects that berate a pirate, it does not mean they do not exist. We have to worry about security levels, bounty hunters, being scanned, other players, and more. So many times have I lost most of the cargo I pirated because the police appeared quite too early.

Traders need to submit and boost, and when faced with a pirate, drop some cargo. Or, if you don't want to drop some cargo, you could use countermeasures, shield boosters, use silent running and heat sinks, spend money on good thrusters, fly through high-security systems... You have it extremely easy.

Piracy is the hardest role in the game by a long shot, and there is no reason to give traders any more of an advantage.

I do both trading and piracy and i entirely agree with you. trading is way easier and way more profitable.

And when i trade, i am actually pretty happy to encounter real pirates...unfortunately most of the times it's just psychos (AKA griefers) who just want to take me down for fun...but i also find it fun to escape them actually! Challenge!

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

"Piracy is the hardest role in the game by a long shot..."

That is as maybe, but given Pirates are bunch of rich boys (how else could they have afforded those fancy ships?) doing it for the thrill I am not sure we should feel sorry for them or want to give them any sort of advantage.

The best thing a trader can do when faced by a pirate is to run if possible and self-destruct if it isn't. Give them nothing.

Piracy should be implemented so one can reliably and moderately quickly (in relation to bounty hunting, for example) grow his/her bank account and buy better ships, i.e do the credit progression and not be stomped upon by everybody. I fly a Cobra and sometimes a Viper, and do nothing but piracy, except for some smuggling on the side, and the occasional bounty mission. The game advertised piracy as a role, and thus it should be supported.

To make piracy ineffective against players is to erase piracy PvP, which in turn erases all PvP, as traders won't fight pirates any longer, and bounty hunters would no longer have anyone to hunt. it is undeniable that piracy should and will be supported, as it has it's own post in the DDA.

Why the vitriol? There's no reason to be upset.