Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
... and that consent can be removed at any time, given the features available to players with no restriction on their use.
Again, opinions vary.
Ignoring or harming PvP in game design is contributing to ganking
- Thread starter Hole in Head
- Start date
Hence the quotes
Why are you expecting players to give you a fair fight? Look at your radar, check your contacts, it's not hard to avoid a interdiction if you start loop or don't slow down you'll almost always be able to stall for time to hyper jump away. And if you do get interdicted it's not hard to survive for long enough to escape, just make sure to submit if you can't win the interdiction mini-game. When CMDR's try to pirate me, not once have they come even in close. I make sure I am flying a ship that can endure long enough to jump away. Even when I was flying my Type 6 I was able to escape player pirates because I actually put good shields and defenses on it. \
IF you eschew protection in the name of more profit, than you are also putting yourself at greater risk. I have legit killed unshielded t9 pilots more common than I care to admit because I had illegal cargo/passengers and was boosting to the station to avoid a scan. Fly with shields.
Here is a quote to sum it up.
“If you find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics suck.”― Steinbeck John
If the concept of other players attacking you and not fighting fair is too much to bear, solo mode is a option. And before you say "but I want to see other players!" well private mode is also a option!
IF you eschew protection in the name of more profit, than you are also putting yourself at greater risk. I have legit killed unshielded t9 pilots more common than I care to admit because I had illegal cargo/passengers and was boosting to the station to avoid a scan. Fly with shields.
Here is a quote to sum it up.
“If you find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics suck.”― Steinbeck John
If the concept of other players attacking you and not fighting fair is too much to bear, solo mode is a option. And before you say "but I want to see other players!" well private mode is also a option!
Last edited:
See there's your category error.
For the trader it's perfectly functional without the pirate. The pirate is only ever a negative for the trader because none of the possible outcomes of the interaction can give them anything. They can only ever avoid a loss, never make a gain. The interactions you want are zero sum, one person has more fun at the expense of another person having less fun. FDev have decided that zero sum interactions are bad for their game and given players the ability to avoid them by blocking the people who want to have fun at their expense, or logging off to get away from them.
what if they instigated a system whereby you could report the pirate/attempted pirate to the local authorities much in the same way that you hand in exploration data for profit?
That already happens, it's what the bounty system is, it just doesn't give you anything as anyone but a Q ship.
(Speaking of, Q ships are impossible despite allegedly existing in the universe (Keelback and Type 10) because you can get too much information about a ship before interdiction, you should only be able to see the tonnage from supercruise, not what type of ship it is or anything it's carrying)
You only get that if you destroy them though, I'm talking about simply reporting them
What's a Q ship ?
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
Q-ship - Wikipedia
I didn't realise I had to stipulate that
applied to the Elite Dangerous use of the term.
applied to the Elite Dangerous use of the term.
Possible, if you got a tip-off reward for crimes against you that you got as soon as you got pulled down, but I suspect there would be ways to exploit that. Especially if it was a fine levied against the player that did it. (Remember, to make this symmetrical for the trader them "winning" by escaping has to be a negative experience for the player that tried to pirate them, and it has to scale with the potential gains the pirate could have made if they "won".)
Q-Ships were world war 2 combat ships disguised as cargo ships and mixed in with convoys, so that if the convoy was attacked they could drop the fake sheeting pretending to be cargo and return fire, usually with 5" guns. Some had catapult launched fighters to protect against air attack. It's what the Keelback is supposed to be in game, something that externally looks identical to a defenceless Type 6 but is actually armed and armoured.
But it doesn't matter because you can tell it's a Keelback before you get near enough to be suckered in.
If you could only tell before the interdiction the vague weight class of the ship you were interdicting, then a player pirate would have to take actual risks because is that 2000t signature a defenceless type 9 carrying a fat payday or a haz-res stomping Cutter and they'll die of old age before they get through its shields?
Last edited:
Yeah, I've had more success making a trader that looks like a combat ship than a combat ship that looks like a trader - because a corvette can happily carry a decent tonnage of goods that a scanner can't distinguish from reinforcements and can still have lightweight powered-down guns strapped on for show, a corvette can still make a decent hauler while masquerading as a combat fit, whereas a type-9 will never be an effective combat ship no matter what you try to load it with besides cargo.
Hiding info about what ship is carrying untill intercepted would be nice detail. Q-ship could be funny concept.
The game supposedly is set up for piracy, if one party can escape unscathed they win- in the traders case they lose no cargo, or ship. The pirate, who wants the cargo, gets nothing.
Pirates are parasitical, but establish the need for bounty hunters and trader protection. WIthout that ecosystem, it creates a mindless, montotone gameworld with little mixing.
Which means ironically you already have an Open PvE mode then, rather than one that has consequences for actions.
You know what's fun? When I've been mining and jump into my sell system with full cargo and see it full of hollow squares. When I start to SC from the star and those squares seem to approach me. When I take evasive action to avoid the squares getting behind me. That's fun! I can't just play mindlessly and SCA to the station with no risk.
A famous quote come to mind: "It's not the destination which matters, but the journey"
A journey with player pirates is far more interesting and engaging than none, and that's why I mine in open. And yes, even gankers and griefers make the journey more interesting, and while I prefer pirates, I'd take the risk of the former over none.
What FD need to do is make the security response now much faster and reactive if you want greater protection from proper pirates.
Its only when you are hostile do SC security ships actually take an interest in you- it should be that once you gain an assault charge in a system (not murder) the cops actively want to talk to you and keep on popping up regardless of subsequent crimes if they scan you in SC. Your idea could fit into that, where the minute the pirate is reported (or killer maybe too) it makes security zoom in on that player flying about.
It should also be security response times much quicker based on the attacks proximity to shipping lanes and stations, and that the hidden BGS stats of wealth, technology level dictates the security strength- so Sol would have ATR levels of security, while some backwater shack outpost rusty Sidewinders.
Another way that could give tip offs is having a scannable rap sheet. A good pirate will always have lots of assaults and few murder charges, while someone who kills for jollies will have more murders than assaults. Seeing this as a ratio might give someone a quick overview of that lurking Clipper.
A long time ago in the DDF there was talk of dummy cargo that were disguised mines, which is not exactly the same thing but an interesting weapon.
Robert Maynard
Volunteer Moderator
PvE piracy exists.
I would be surprised if a huge number of players would want to play the role of "the herd" for the pirates and bounty hunters to have their fun - as I'm not seeing how playing as one of "the herd" is "fun" in that context.
Those are all really solid ideas, I like 'em.
Having the security scalable based on the various attributes of a system I think would be a really good addition
Player piracy to me is no problem, it is within setting and lore of the game universe. In fact (unless it is mission cargo) I would probably go along and accept reasonable demands of pirate.