Just an idea...

[Noddie]

I think it might help to make ships harder to destroy, but easier to damage. IE when you get shot up you see a lot of module damage and even cargo being damaged - but just about any ship can weather the storm for long enough to escape (high-wake), from any likely attacker (or wing of them). The idea is that random attackers can't actually kill anyone who doesn't hang around for the right (although they will lose something).

Also. If the ship is carrying cargo for a faction, that faction puts a bounty on the head of the pirate who destroys the cargo. The bounty being known to the carrier, but not to the pirate (until they get it). Bounty will vary according to what's being carried, and the couriers and pirate's reputation with the faction who own it.

The idea is to make piracy a "thing", without the pirates being killers and allow PVP to have some consequences and risks, without making it too drastic for people who don't want to do it.

The only problem I can immediately see is that it would make PVe either very different from PVP, or much harder and more drawn out. UNLESS you offer bounty for attacking and damaging a wanted NPC to compensate for this.

 

[Stealthie]

Yeah, that sounds reasonable to me.

As you say, the main "problem" would be balancing PvP vs PvE play.

In things like RESs and CZs it'd be a bit of a pain if you could disable a ship but then had to carry on blasting away at it for another 30 seconds to actually get the hull down to 0% and destroy it in order to be credited for the kill.

I guess the simplest "workaround" would be if NPC ships self-destruct once they're disabled.
That could even add to the variety of the game in that some NPCs might choose to self-destruct as soon as they're disabled whereas others might be more stubborn, requiring you to keep blasting at them.

On the assumption that NPCs somehow survive the destruction of their ships (in the same way we do), it's plausible that an NPC might choose to self-destruct their ship so they could escape their crippled ship, get back to a station and jump into a new ship for another go.

 

[Alex Brentnall]

but just about any ship can weather the storm for long enough to escape (high-wake), from any likely attacker (or wing of them).

So you've kinda wrote the problem into the question there and I think you can see the difficulty. How can you balance the same system for a 1v1 and a 4v1 attack.

Lets assume identical ships in both damage and health. There's two ways of balancing:
The current system works on raw numbers which would give the ships an equal 1v1 scenario but a vastly unbalanced 4v1 scenario. Your proposal is then just a hull buff or perhaps a non-linear health bar.

Alternatively a new model could come in which scales defence/offence based on number of enemies, handicap system basically. AFAIK the Thargoids use this and are tougher when facing groups than solo. This means a balanced 1v1 scenario and a tweak-able 4v1 scenario so it favours the 4 but gives the 1 a chance. The big downside is it's obvious and "gamey", very non-simulator and annoys a lot of people.

 

[Sylveria]

That'd be great, except not all "pirates" are attacking ships to obtain cargo. (at least players)

They don't see a "profit" in piracy as it currently stands in-game, therefore they elect to destroy ships instead. (but insist on not calling themselves "murderers")

Game mechanics won't solve the problem for "piracy", it's ultimately still the choice of the player shooting the victim.

As for the intention of the mechanic, it's sound in theory that perhaps once a ship reaches 50% hull or something perhaps the majority of damage would defer to modules and the hull itself becomes more difficult to destroy- but ultimately you're going to have a lot of players who complain it's a "weapon nerf", or that certain weapons don't do proper damage in proportion, etc. I'm not "for" or "against" it, just tossing some things to think about out there. The pendulum of balancing always swings both ways, after all.