So you want to be a pirate?
You've been playing for a couple of days or weeks or so. You have a decent credit pool, but are by no means rich. You're tired of grinding bounties at nav points or delivering toxic waste for paltry sums of credits. You want some excitement in your life. You want to interact with other players in this seemingly barren and empty universe. While not a well paying career, it's very exciting, which is a reward in itself. Traders will hate you, bounty-hunters will hunt you, and lesser pirates will envy you. If you're anything like me, you want to pirate real players as opposed to NPCs who seem to only carry toxic waste around, so this thread is dedicated to the theory and craft of player piracy. I'll do what I can to set you on the right (or wrong!) path to a fun, adrenaline filled, and potentially lucrative career of piracy! Take your share and then take some more!
Where do does one even begin?
Well, first let's get you equipped and ready to face the dangerous life of a pirate. Piracy is divided into what I imagine as 3 tiers, which we will address in order. Even the lowest tier will require some money to get started initially. I recommend about 500k-600k to start tier 1, but you can get away with less with a bit of creativity. Each tier will have 3 categories, which I like to call "SOS": (It's a play on words since that is the message victims will be sending)
Ships, Organization, and Strategy.
Tier 1:
Ships:
Unfortunately, you don't get much choice in this regard. In tier 1, you will be hunting Haulers, Sidewinders, Adders and Eagles. If you fly smart, you can catch the occasional Cobra, but that is mostly reserved for tier 2. I've done extensive theorycrafting, but the only ship that I can really make work is the Adder. The Eagle and Sidewinder lack the internals and the Hauler is just too slow and poorly equipped offensively. The Adder fits the bill perfectly though and the size 2 weapon slot really makes for some interesting fittings.
So you've bought your Adder for 80,000 credits or so. What's next? Surely you can't just go out and start hunting in the stock Adder? I've done some testing and I'll show you what I use for this tier.
In the top mounted size 2 slot, I have a size 2 fixed Railgun. One of these beautiful pieces of machinery will cost you 400,000 credits alone. A size 1 railgun is a cheaper alternative that only costs 50,000 credits. In the bottom two slots, I run burst lasers, but pulse or beam lasers work just as fine. A word of warning, these weapons are very power hungry, so you may need to upgrade your power plant.
For your two utility slots, you should run a cargo scanner and a utility of your choice. Personally, I run chaff as a defensive friendly option. Frameshift scanners are a good option if you plan on following targets to other systems, although I personally do not. Point defense, ECM, and heat sinks are all perfectly reasonable alternatives, but the cargo scanner is a must.
As for upgrades, you don't really need to upgrade anything. As I said, you very well may need to upgrade your power supply to power these weapons. As for upgrade order, I'd do power distribution -> thrusters -> shields -> frameshift -> everything else.
Let's talk about internals. Pirates need a wide variety of internals to be successful. For the Adder, I recommend keeping the shield in the size 3 internal, and an 8 slot cargo bin in the other size 3. The last 3 slots are very much up to your discretion. One of the remaining 3 slots must be a frameshift interdictor, but which one is up to you. Personally, I fly with a size 2 shield cell and size 2 interdictor for easier interdictions with a type A fuel scoop in the size 1 slot. You could just as easily downgrade the interdictor to size 1, and put 8 more tons of cargo in the remaining size 2 slots. Honestly, the fuel scoop isn't terribly useful, so I'll probably trade it out for cargo space, but how you fit your size 2 and 1 internals is up to you. A limpet breaker is also a reasonable addition, but this guide will focus primarily on manually disabling cargo-hatches.
To sum up fittings for your Adder:
Weapons-
Size 2 Railgun
Size 1 Lasers of your choice
Utility-
Cargo Scanner
Utility of your choice
Internals-
Size 3 Cargo Hold
Size 3 Shield Generator
Size 2 Optional (One of these 3 must be an interdictor)
Size 2 Optional
Size 1 Optional
Organization:
This bit is the one I have the most trouble with. Organization is finding a base of operations and a place to hunt your targets. You want a hunting ground that has easy access to a black market, you don't mind being wanted in, and has a reasonable number of players. For tier 1, you'll mainly be hunting new ships so the starting zones are probably your best bet. There should be a reasonable number of smaller ships here and the starting zones shouldn't be too far from a black market. Since I didn't start out pirating, this is tougher for me to comment on and very much up to individual preference. You have to find a location with the right balance for yourself.
Strategy:
So you have your location and your ship, it's time to get to work. Unfortunately, this may require a bit of waiting around in supercruise. What you're looking for is a target, but depending on the location and time, this could take a bit. Personally, I recommend netflix, but if you've picked a good location, you shouldn't have to wait too long before a target comes around. I usually wait far enough from the star so I can get up to speed very quickly and get behind the target once they are spotted. This should give you enough time to interdict before they can jump to another system or dock somewhere. While I'm maneuvering to get behind them, I usually send them a warning message so they know what to expect, "Yarr, I'm a pirate.", something to that effect. This let's them know it is a player interdiction, gives them some time to prepare mentally and reduces the chances that they freak out and do something stupid.
Once you've successfully interdicted them (I've never had any problems with interdictions. If you do, you may have to practice a bit on NPCs), you should demand that they drop cargo then you have 2 options depending on the situation.
The first is if you expect them to run right off the bat. If they instantly go for the escape, you have to go on the offensive and go for the disable. If they looks somewhat cooperative and aren't running, you can start a cargo scan. Once you've scanned them down, you have to decide if the loot is worth it. Either way, chances are, by this point they aren't terribly cooperative, which will be the case the majority of the time. Either they let you scan and started running, opened fire, or started running immediately. Either way, you have to try to disable them. First, take down their shields. If they attacked you, then you can punish them for their hubris or flee. If there is no loot to be had, it's not worth the fight. It depends on the situation really. Usually, by this point they should be running away, if not it will make disabling much more difficult.
So, either they are running shield-less or you've disabled their shields, it's time to go in for the disable. Using your rail-gun, very carefully aim at their drives. Be sure to have cycle subsystem key bound to something you can press and cycle through until you select one of their drives. Once targetted and very carefully aimed, hit their drives with the rail-gun. If it's size 1, it'll do a bit under 50% for small ships. If it's size 2, it should do over 90% in 1 hit. Be careful, missing and hitting the hull will do massive damage to small ships so you can only afford 1-2 misses. Once their drives are less than 10%, use your lasers to shave off the remaining percent until the drives are at 0%. Throw in an extra shot just to be sure it isn't .1% rounded down to zero. Once their drives are disabled, you've won. If they managed to supercruise before you disabled their drives, you can either follow them for a follow-up interdiction or give up the chase depending on how much drives/hull damage you've done. There is no reason to chase if you'll just blow them up, since you'll get no cargo out of that.
Now they are floating helplessly, probably spinning with their drives disabled. If your aim was good with the railgun, then they should have most of their hull left, but more than 15% should be enough. It is usually at this point that I ask once more if they would like to jettison their cargo to make my life a bit easier, but this is optional. Now what you'll do is cycle through until you select their cargo hatch. You'll have to maneuver yourself so that you are perpendicular to the cargo-hatch and have a very clear shot at the cargo doors. Using a single laser, carefully send bursts into the cargo hatch stopping in between shots to check for malfunctions. A single burst should do around 8% of the cargo's health and cargo will begin spilling out somewhere between 75% and 50% integrity. Depending on how much cargo they have, you may need several malfunctions to get all the cargo. Once all the cargo is out and about, wish the trader a wonderful day, scoop your cargo, and leave them to float into oblivion. After all, you don't need a murder bounty on your head. Stealthily take your loot to a black market and enjoy your new found wealth!
I recorded a video of myself doing this exact exercise to give you a better idea of how to do it. At the beginning, I was a bit confused since I didn't realize I didn't have my frameshift interdictor in my current firegroup, but I eventually figured it out. Special thanks to the (un)willing participant.
[video=youtube;-TrP5WrDpJY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TrP5WrDpJY&feature=youtu.be[/video]
Tier 2:
I'll keep this concise, since I haven't done a huge amount of pirating at this level. The ship you want here is a Cobra with a similar fitting to the Adder. For weapons, I recommend a Size 2 railgun, a laser of some sort and the remaining 2 slots are up to your discretion. You'll need the cargo scanner, frameshift interdictor and plenty of cargo space, but fitting is very much up to your own personal taste. You will be hunting primarily other Cobras and Type 6s at this level. You can also hunt anything smaller if you so desire, but I find it's poor taste to interdict sidewinders in a Cobra.
Organization and strategy is identical, so I don't think I'll rehash that debate. As for location, you'll want to move away from the starting systems and find profitable trade routes where lakons are more likely to traverse. Always offer them the opportunity to jettison only portions of their cargo if you can't carry it all. For example, if your cobra has 30 slots and you interdict a Type 6 with 100 slots, offer him the opportunity to abandon 30 cargo before firing any shots.
Tier 3:
This is one I looked forward to the most and was the most disappointed in. This tier is almost exclusively for the Imperial Clipper. It is a very heavy and very fast ship allowing you to mass lock large ships and keep up with them with ease. Unfortunately, mass-locking with the Clipper is bugged and I found that I'd need to get about 10 tons of gold per interdiction to pay for the damage done by the interdiction itself. With this ship, you can pirate virtually any ship (assuming mass locking is fixed), but chances are, you will only lose money unless you exclusively interdict lakons and are always successful. It's pretty fun, but probably too expensive to justify it.
When do I kill?
This has been a constant topic of debate, so I just thought I'd give my opinion. Bounties are more expensive than they were before. 10,000 credits per kill as opposed to the 400 or so you get for the aggression. If you can disable without killing, this is ideal. On the other hand, bounty might be a source of pride for some people. In my opinion, you should never really have to kill small ships. The cost almost never justifies the reward. Sometimes though, you have to send a message. If pirates didn't pose the threat of death, nobody would fear them. But my argument against this is that disabling is just as much of a death sentence without the negative consequences and should be preferred whenever possible. I would like to note though, that I am in favor of the devs adding in some way to recover after your drives are disabled. I don't know how, maybe an emergency beacon or a reduced insurance fee or a towing charge or something. So the bottom line is, use your best judgement. 99% of the time, it's better to let your target get away than blow them up. If they're incredibly bad mannered, aggressive and disabling is not an option, go ahead and put them down. But chances are, letting them get away is the better option.
Communication is the key to piracy, and if you don't communicate well, for all they know you are interdicting with the sole intent to kill. You should make it clear that if they part with some of their cargo, you will let them go. Of course, in the heat of the moment, there is little time for pleasantries, but it is your responsibility to make it as clear as possible.
With that sorted, good luck future pirates! I look forward to hearing of your adventures. I'd love to see some videos of other peoples pirating attempts. If you have any comments or criticisms, I'd love to hear them. If you'll excuse me, I have to don my full-body flame protection suit for even making the mere suggestion of shooting another player.
Last edited:
