Make Pirate Attack awesome!

[Aktch]

The way Pirate Attacks work right now thy are pretty much meaningless. Just a place that has a good price for diamonds with no good explanation and no effect on the players.

So i have a suggestion to make these truely mean something and justify the high reward for Void Opals there. This is going to be a big one:

Lore
Since this will take a long time to implement I would suggest to use that time to implement a Lore for these Pirate Attacks via GalNet.
Over the time there will be reports about a mysterious Pirate Faction that work coordinated miltaristic attacks on the small systems of the outer Bubble. Then a damaged capital ship (from Thargoid attacks or some war) will be captuered by that group. This will happen a few times actually. Then they attack a huge System (something like Sol or similar). This is when the feature is implemented (maybe even with a CG).

Occurence and Duration
These Pirates seek true riches and are not afraid of security forces. That is why these Pirate Attacks will focus on happy systems in Investment and Civil Liberty (this will also keep the gold rush going). Only Factions controlling large Orbital Station can be attacked.
Duration will be 4-7 days, the same as with conflicts.

Gameplay
Once a Faction is under Pirate Attacked all their large Assets are shown as "under Pirate Attack" in the System map and when trageting them in supercruise. When you drop into an attacked station you will drop 15-20 km away and a lot of hostile pirate ships will fly around and attack security and players alike. The weapon systems outside the station are inactive due to pirate interference. The player will get a prompt of choosing either the side of the Pirates or that of the controlling Faction. If you just want to sell your precious goods you can not choose a side, but you'll still have to run the blockade in order to dock at the station. So you need decent shields and PDs on you miner (that actually makes these ludicrous prices for gems legit). Otherwise you can use these stations as normal but restock, repair, shipyard and outfitting services are busy and require a 3 minute wait to be activated due to the ongoing battle.

If you choose the side of the controlling faction a 20 min. timer will start and you will get a bar similar to conflict zones where you have to kill a certain amount of Pirates before the timer runs out. In addition to normal bounties these Pirates will have Pilot Federation Bounties since they are wanted all over the bubble (this will make participating more rewarding as well). You can dock during the fight but need to wait those three minutes for any repairs or restocks. If the controlling faction is successful, the pirates wil retreat and there will be a payout (something like 5 mil.) and the player(s) can dock and conduct business as usual until relogging or reentry (at which point the whole thing starts all over).

If you choose the side of the Pirate Faction you will need to protect the pirates and kill security vessels. As a supporter for the pirates you will recieve bounties but no notoriety. You cannot dock when fighting for the pirates and the weapons inside the station will still be active and shoot you down if you tried. If the bar is not filled within those 20 mins the Pirate Faction wins. In that case the Station will go dark and a pirate capital ship will appear right in front of the station. After the ship appears another timer (let's say 10 mins) will start where the pirates can plunder the station. Basically you can dock now with some pirate assigning a pad for you. You will only have two options upon arrival. One is to scrape your record (thus removing your local bounties) and the other is to plunder. Basically you just take tons of a commodity called "plunder" and ferry it out to the pirate capital ship where you can now dock (two large and two medium pads) and load of the plunder. NPCs will do the same. At the end of the timer you need to be out of the station since weapons will go live again (inside the station). The pirate capital ship wil jump out and all players will get a payout according to how much plunder was accumulated (5-15 mil would be apropriate i think).

Mission Board and BGS
Winning or losing against the Pirates is counted like every other war. The most battles won per day win the day. Winning four days wins the conflict. During the conflict both security and economy will constantly drain at a huge rate if not counteracted by bounties and trade. The controlling faction offers loads of kill Pirate Lord missions and Massacre Missions which also count towards victory for the Faction (but less then a battle won i would say 1:3). If an Anarchy Faction is present, it will give Massacre Security Forces and kill officers missions, which in turn will count toward the Pirate Faction.

Consequences
If the controlling Faction is victorious the faction will gain 15% Inf. and a lot of security and and econimic growth. If an Anarchy Faction is present it will lose that much influence (or until it is at 1%) the rest will be divided on all other factions.

If the Pirates are victorious there are several options:

Option A
The controlling faction loses 15% inf. and will plumet into economic bust and civil unrest (maybe even famine). If an Anarchy Faction is present it will gain 15% and get eco boost.

Option B
The controlling faction enters a state of beeing held hostage. That means the market it closed and only black market is active. Bounties cannot be collected in the System and economy and security will constantly drain. The system is for the duration basically lawless. Only way out of it are special missions offered by the controlling Faction.

Option C
The attacking Pirate Faction enters the system as a new minor faction and takes immediate controll of one asset. It starts with equal inf as the (formerly) controlling faction thus starting a regular war. Other minor factions might leapfrog them that way.

In either case, if the Pirate faction wins, a nearby system (40ly) will be attacked during the next tick.

So what do you guys think?

 

[Miko]

The way Pirate Attacks work right now thy are pretty much meaningless. Just a place that has a good price for diamonds with no good explanation and no effect on the players.

So i have a suggestion to make these truely mean something and justify the high reward for Void Opals there. This is going to be a big one:

Lore
Since this will take a long time to implement I would suggest to use that time to implement a Lore for these Pirate Attacks via GalNet.
Over the time there will be reports about a mysterious Pirate Faction that work coordinated miltaristic attacks on the small systems of the outer Bubble. Then a damaged capital ship (from Thargoid attacks or some war) will be captuered by that group. This will happen a few times actually. Then they attack a huge System (something like Sol or similar). This is when the feature is implemented (maybe even with a CG).

Occurence and Duration
These Pirates seek true riches and are not afraid of security forces. That is why these Pirate Attacks will focus on happy systems in Investment and Civil Liberty (this will also keep the gold rush going). Only Factions controlling large Orbital Station can be attacked.
Duration will be 4-7 days, the same as with conflicts.

Gameplay
Once a Faction is under Pirate Attacked all their large Assets are shown as "under Pirate Attack" in the System map and when trageting them in supercruise. When you drop into an attacked station you will drop 15-20 km away and a lot of hostile pirate ships will fly around and attack security and players alike. The weapon systems outside the station are inactive due to pirate interference. The player will get a prompt of choosing either the side of the Pirates or that of the controlling Faction. If you just want to sell your precious goods you can not choose a side, but you'll still have to run the blockade in order to dock at the station. So you need decent shields and PDs on you miner (that actually makes these ludicrous prices for gems legit). Otherwise you can use these stations as normal but restock, repair, shipyard and outfitting services are busy and require a 3 minute wait to be activated due to the ongoing battle.

If you choose the side of the controlling faction a 20 min. timer will start and you will get a bar similar to conflict zones where you have to kill a certain amount of Pirates before the timer runs out. In addition to normal bounties these Pirates will have Pilot Federation Bounties since they are wanted all over the bubble (this will make participating more rewarding as well). You can dock during the fight but need to wait those three minutes for any repairs or restocks. If the controlling faction is successful, the pirates wil retreat and there will be a payout (something like 5 mil.) and the player(s) can dock and conduct business as usual until relogging or reentry (at which point the whole thing starts all over).

If you choose the side of the Pirate Faction you will need to protect the pirates and kill security vessels. As a supporter for the pirates you will recieve bounties but no notoriety. You cannot dock when fighting for the pirates and the weapons inside the station will still be active and shoot you down if you tried. If the bar is not filled within those 20 mins the Pirate Faction wins. In that case the Station will go dark and a pirate capital ship will appear right in front of the station. After the ship appears another timer (let's say 10 mins) will start where the pirates can plunder the station. Basically you can dock now with some pirate assigning a pad for you. You will only have two options upon arrival. One is to scrape your record (thus removing your local bounties) and the other is to plunder. Basically you just take tons of a commodity called "plunder" and ferry it out to the pirate capital ship where you can now dock (two large and two medium pads) and load of the plunder. NPCs will do the same. At the end of the timer you need to be out of the station since weapons will go live again (inside the station). The pirate capital ship wil jump out and all players will get a payout according to how much plunder was accumulated (5-15 mil would be apropriate i think).

Mission Board and BGS
Winning or losing against the Pirates is counted like every other war. The most battles won per day win the day. Winning four days wins the conflict. During the conflict both security and economy will constantly drain at a huge rate if not counteracted by bounties and trade. The controlling faction offers loads of kill Pirate Lord missions and Massacre Missions which also count towards victory for the Faction (but less then a battle won i would say 1:3). If an Anarchy Faction is present, it will give Massacre Security Forces and kill officers missions, which in turn will count toward the Pirate Faction.

Consequences
If the controlling Faction is victorious the faction will gain 15% Inf. and a lot of security and and econimic growth. If an Anarchy Faction is present it will lose that much influence (or until it is at 1%) the rest will be divided on all other factions.

If the Pirates are victorious there are several options:

Option A
The controlling faction loses 15% inf. and will plumet into economic bust and civil unrest (maybe even famine). If an Anarchy Faction is present it will gain 15% and get eco boost.

Option B
The controlling faction enters a state of beeing held hostage. That means the market it closed and only black market is active. Bounties cannot be collected in the System and economy and security will constantly drain. The system is for the duration basically lawless. Only way out of it are special missions offered by the controlling Faction.

Option C
The attacking Pirate Faction enters the system as a new minor faction and takes immediate controll of one asset. It starts with equal inf as the (formerly) controlling faction thus starting a regular war. Other minor factions might leapfrog them that way.

In either case, if the Pirate faction wins, a nearby system (40ly) will be attacked during the next tick.

So what do you guys think?

This probably got forgotten due to being moved to suggestions, unless you posted it here. Moderators tend to move these things from the main forum, which is where people tend to reside and see this valuable content. Sadly your suggestion never came to fruition.

 

[Para Handy]

 

[DemiserofD]

I don't think it's right to think of Pirate Attack being pirates attempting to affect political influence. Pirates don't want to be politicians, they want to get their loot and get away.

Frankly, pirate capital ships and whatnot doesn't make very much sense. Consider history. Pirates didn't make huge fleets and fight against the fleets of nations, they hid in the shadows and raided where nations were weak. A Pirate Attack would be more like a nation leaving a port unguarded, and a group of cutthroats band together to loot it before reinforcements can be assembled.

With this in mind, here's how I think it should happen.

Start: An alert goes out that "Port X" has experienced a Pirate Attack. They struck while defenses were distracted elsewhere and stole many of the most valuable goods, driving prices for those goods sky-high.

Middle: Pirates continue to raid the rest of the system, searching for whatever loot they can acquire before reinforcements arrive. The more goods are sold at local stations, the more active pirates become. The more government ships killed, the more active the pirates become. By contrast, the more pirates are killed, the less active the pirates become, until they are potentially driven away.

End: At the end of the Pirate Attack's maximum duration, a fleet of government ships arrive and drive away the pirate threat, assuming players didn't do anything to stop them. A few pirates will be destroyed, but most will already have fled.

--

Now, the fun bit: Somewhere in the system, there is a hidden Pirate Base. It might be on a planet, it might be an asteroid base hidden in a ring, or it might be an outpost hidden in deep space. Every time a player kills a pirate, they have a chance to find a Map Fragment. Find all the map fragments, and they are given the location of the Pirate Base. Chances of getting a fragment are something like 1/200, and there might be 5 map fragments, so you'd need to kill on average 2280 pirates to find the entire map. Alternatively, the player can just search rigorously for its location, and they might find it that way.

When you arrive at the base, it is neutral to the player, enshrouded with many pirate ships, as well as turrets. It would be very difficult for even an engineered solo player to handle them all. But once they are all killed, the pirate base surrenders and you get all the loot inside; a huge cache of high-value commodities. 5000 platinum, 5000 tritium, 15000 gold, 15000 palladium, that order of things. The player has one week to unload the base before it self destructs. But, the Pirate Attack ends the moment the base surrenders. Alternatively, the player can buy illegal goods from the base for low prices and smuggle them elsewhere to sell. However, the moment the base runs out of goods, the pirate attack ends. The base can be restocked by encouraging pirate activity.

--

I think this is more in keeping with what a 'real' pirate attack would look like. Not a political invasion, but a quick, dirty raid, grabbing what they can before inevitably being chased away.

 

[dunno]

There have been Pirates, Buccaneers, Privateers. One persons pirate is another's buccaneer. The history of Piracy is fascinating, it was only Piracy if you didn't have the backing of your government.

I just wish that NPC pirates with high bounties could actually be found, kinda pointless to advertise them and they're nowhere to be found.