Hmmm, this is an interesting one.
Are you certain it was the point defense killing the limpets? I guess it's possible, but I've only ever seen point defense shoot down incoming Hatchbreakers, never collectors. Also, if the point defense was doing such a good job, hatchbreakers would have struggled to loosen the loot in the first place.
From your description, it doesn't sound like you immobilized the T7? (taking it's power plant to 0%)
This would mean the loot would be spread far and wide. Collectors hover under your ship until close enough to the loot (a bit over 1km I believe). Did you actually see them running around picking up?
The most likely issues I can think of from you description are:
- firing too many limpets at once. Your limpet controller(s) can only allow a certain number of active limpets at one time. Depending on the module size and class. For instance, my one only allows a maximum 3 at any one time. If I launch 3, then launch a fourth, the oldest one will self destruct. So if i were to spam limpets would ultimately leave me with just 3 alive ones.
- targeted limpets vs roaming ones. A common mistake is to have a piece of loot targeted when you launch your collector(s). Limpets have 2 modes. When you have loot targeted and launch a limpet, it will pick up ONLY that one piece of loot - return to the ship - then SELF DESTRUCT. Single use only.
When you have NOTHING targeted and launch a limpet, it will roam around picking up whatever comes in range, until it eventually expires. (limited lifetime)
- the loot itself has a limited lifetime and expires too. Perhaps you figured out the limpets/opened cargo hatch a little late and they were all expiring?
- are you sure you were stopped? (or at most 5 m/s). If the loot was scattered far and wide, then I can imagine you'd have to move around a bit to come within collector range. if moving too fast or erratically (> 5 m/s) they tend to take too much damage entering the scoop and the loot explode. Also, once they are off fetching some loot, you have to make sure you don't move out of their range, or the collectors will fail.
Hope this helps. A youtuber WiggyB has some great NPC Piracy videos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2kVDfy35SE
