The Dance of Pirate and Traders. Advice for both parties

[goemon]

A fun solution could be tethers/grappling hooks fired by Harpoon (obvs) that has a hefty cool down and only works on smaller ships than the launcher.

love it. why letting it work only on smaller ships than the launcher? i would love to drawn and quarter a pirate after he launched his harpoon from his cobra on my python. would be a reason to outfit my python for trading

seriously, this could add more piloting skills to the pirating/pirated game!

 

[Sandmann]

love it. why letting it work only on smaller ships than the launcher? i would love to drawn and quarter a pirate after he launched his harpoon from his cobra on my python. would be a reason to outfit my python for trading

seriously, this could add more piloting skills to the pirating/pirated game!

This is (I believe) what the cargo hatch drone things are supposed to do, but from everything I've been told they basically don't. There's a lot of work needs to be done on piracy to make it a mature part of the game. (Same could be said for several other parts too, I guess)

I kinda like the idea of a small ship harpooning a bigger one and being dragged across known space like a whale towing a longboat.

 

[khaitom]

I remember when piracy in ED meant disabling your victims drives and shooting out the cargo hatch. Why are pirates now insisting it's jetison free gold or die?

 

[Miklos Atreides]

At first sorry for not reading every post on this thread. Too many posts, too little time.

But reviewing last 12 months I had maybe 2 or 3 player assaults on my way through the galaxy.
I can only remember one psychotic guy interdiction and shooting my ASP in a Python.

But I survived that CMDR by patience. A phyton cannot catch up a T6 and a few seconds later
you are out of fire range. Havin a usable Powerdistributor will give you the opportunity to sit
this situation out and move out of sensors range and then chargin. This will prevent your
pirate to know when you get into SC and stick to the low wage.

In the opposite to the recommendations of OP I do not submit to interdiction unless I want to have a look
who the hell tries to interdict me. As shown by numbers above it is very most likely that your interdictior is a NPC.
Meanwhile I have some experience in Interdiction games and can win 9 of 10 with NPCs. So why submitting
if you can leave them behind.

Only wish they were treated like a Player when they loose.

Basic recommedations for players are truely

A = use a shield / maybe armour to withstand while charging when running and bein locked.
B = don't bet all your Cr on this one trade.
C = sometimes it can be better not to use the most common paths. Try a little out. going 5 ly aside can make a difference

If it makes sense be armed to be a surprise. Make the pirates pay for your load.

Regards,
Miklos

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

Pirates want to play with others in a competitive way. Traders don't. They want to have a relaxing time raking in profits. I know this is a bit of a generalisation, but for the majority this is how it is, and you're not going to have much success getting the 2 playing together, especially with solo and pve groups in the mix. A trader can just say 'What's the point of me giving up cargo space and slowing my profits when I can just go solo?'

Traders don't need pirates. But they would've increased the longevity of the game for them if they were forced into the same universe together with them and we had a much better setup, ie multiplayer only, real consequences for combat logging, working wake scanners that can be used for pvp, decent profits, etc. Right now we have a trader force racing their way into the biggest ships possible and a completely demoralized pirate force who's pretty much given up working due to a broken system.

the problem is just the balance in the game in general.

a trader buys wares, (invests money) to make a price related profit. But then trader ships significantly sacrifice defense power for this. And in their worst case they can neither outrun nor outshoot a well equipped pirate. And then they do not only lose the ship, they even lose the cargo and with this a lot of money + insurance.

While the pirate doesn't invest anything except his ships insurance. if traders should be more "competitve" in multiplayer, they need some emergency call features that leaves a signal on the system so that other players like bounty hunters can enter the scene as well.

And thats why you can not force them to play in the same universe:
Trading (importing and exporting) goods to stations does not effect powerplay and other featurs of a system (like tech to sell and ships). Therefore it is not needed. So being a week trader is pointless and forced to Open World gameplay would basically make every trader cease to exist doing only smuggling missions where you get free goods and large profits due to goods being free. Anything else makes no sense in terms of risks/rewards.
If however said trading would be a important thing to develop a systems and it's wealth (CC for the PP characters generated) Openworld gamers would act differently. Traders would set up convoys for safer trading, or have some bounty hunters escorting them. Because now everyone would work together towards a common goal. But this is lacking in E: D.

E: D is grindy enough of many new players and those with not much time, but getting constantly interdicted without any reason (empty cargo) just for the lulz of another player is not really motivating people to go open mode.

 

[CMDR Zadian Lichtfrost]

I remember when piracy in ED meant disabling your victims drives and shooting out the cargo hatch. Why are pirates now insisting it's jetison free gold or die?

Because it's possible, easier and more profitable?

(And maybe having the chance to destroy ships adds to the fun for them)

 

[khaitom]

But isn't it more fun to chase a trader and forcably relieve them of their goods rather than just destroying their ship, as pirates in this thread say they do?

 

[Sandmann]

But isn't it more fun to chase a trader and forcably relieve them of their goods rather than just destroying their ship, as pirates in this thread say they do?

This comes down to the disjunction between pirates who pirate traders, and people who call themselves pirates just so they can blow up traders for lulz (because a Type 6 is SUCH a challenge to a combat ship, after all, and isn't open all about the "challenge"?).

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

still u didnt answer the question..try again....

I thought I did. A trader should want pirates for balance, pacing, challenge, and because It's elite in a nutshell, but I guess not many kids like to eat vegetables when they can have dessert all the time.

I remember when piracy in ED meant disabling your victims drives and shooting out the cargo hatch. Why are pirates now insisting it's jetison free gold or die?

Limpets and shooting the cargo hatch don't scale up to bigger ships. it's fine for a cobra and under, but the 8-10 you get won't sustain you in bigger ships (asp and above).

 

[Defacto]

That would be even more unprofitable. Goods are already ridicilously cheap, since the price values haven't changed since the Alpha, despite the enormous inflation that has happened in other parts of the economy.
Seriously, the prices of the goods are from the time when killing an Anaconda in a CZ netted you 400 Cr. I don't think the original intention was that ''normal'' trading would be filling your hold with Palladium or Tobacco.

When actually stealing goods, pirates will profit even less and have even more difficulty in selling the goods.
At the same time, it's completely pointless to have a theft protection system in the first place if the pilot can just jettison their goods without them being marked as stolen. Who designed this system? I'm pretty sure that this wasn't in the DDF. It's just another example of things being backwards. Pirates should not expect to be able to sell their goods through legal channels, but the goods are also, overall, very cheap.

 

[DaveB]

What is piracy? What is a pirate? I say I am a pirate, therefore I am a pirate. Whether I kill or not is irrelevant - a lion doesn't concern himself with the opinions of the sheep.

That's what the gankers-for-lulz say too. As it happens, thats what your own earlier post pretty much said you are - you're describing yourself as a PKer who will extort cargo on the side from a player who opts to be totally passive.

The rest of your post is material for the other thread that shall not be named, not this one.

This isn't about "fixing" piracy, the tread was clearly directed at those pirates whose MAIN aim is successfully extracting cargo from their victims holds, and at the traders who see these guys as just a cost of doing business.

The ganker that calls himself a pirate to justify his pewpew habit or the trader that chooses to avoid open altogether to avoid even the kind of pirate this tread was directed at probably don't have a platform in the intended discussion on this thread - both are at best wallflowers in the "dance" the OP referred to in the thread title.

The thread was all about the two groups it WAS directed at and how each can more fully understand how the other is thinking and how their behavior factors into the outcome of the encounter. You clearly have something to contribute to that side of the discussion, even if it was (paraphrasing) "Immediately go passive or I'll start shooting" - which I and others then pointed out was VERY unlikely to happen because that's suicidal unless they already know you're after cargo more than a kill.

You can either stick with your stated position of shrugging and stating that just means you'll kill 'em, which is a position you are perfectly entitled to hold but in which case your part in this discussion is done, or you can engage with the discussion at hand and maybe make a few changes in your approach that will increase your overall return on your piracy. Please, however, don't make it about "incentives for traders to fly in open" because that's a totally different discussion that will rapidly attract the mods merge-bat and, whether you meant it to or not, given your earlier stated attitude will only come across as whining that you don't have enough targets and will devalue the other, more meaningful, contributions you could make to this thread.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

if a trader loses one farming machinery he has to trade like 4-5t of said machinery to make the loss of one even. when a pirate only grabs one of said machinery he can generate a profit worth of like 4t of trading.

Goods aren't very cheap, when you consider the money/time ratio of trading.

That's what the gankers-for-lulz say too. As it happens, thats what your own earlier post pretty much said you are - you're describing yourself as a PKer who will extort cargo on the side from a player who opts to be totally passive.

The rest of your post is material for the other thread that shall not be named, not this one.

This isn't about "fixing" piracy, the tread was clearly directed at those pirates whose MAIN aim is successfully extracting cargo from their victims holds, and at the traders who see these guys as just a cost of doing business.

The ganker that calls himself a pirate to justify his pewpew habit or the trader that chooses to avoid open altogether to avoid even the kind of pirate this tread was directed at probably don't have a platform in the intended discussion on this thread - both are at best wallflowers in the "dance" the OP referred to in the thread title.

The thread was all about the two groups it WAS directed at and how each can more fully understand how the other is thinking and how their behavior factors into the outcome of the encounter. You clearly have something to contribute to that side of the discussion, even if it was (paraphrasing) "Immediately go passive or I'll start shooting" - which I and others then pointed out was VERY unlikely to happen because that's suicidal unless they already know you're after cargo more than a kill.

You can either stick with your stated position of shrugging and stating that just means you'll kill 'em, which is a position you are perfectly entitled to hold but in which case your part in this discussion is done, or you can engage with the discussion at hand and maybe make a few changes in your approach that will increase your overall return on your piracy. Please, however, don't make it about "incentives for traders to fly in open" because that's a totally different discussion that will rapidly attract the mods merge-bat and, whether you meant it to or not, given your earlier stated attitude will only come across as whining that you don't have enough targets and will devalue the other, more meaningful, contributions you could make to this thread.

Thats the issue, those "pirates" that actually are nothing than murderers aren't marked in the game, and therefore, by the frequency of those murderers existing traders will not add real Pirates to their table of possibilities. The risk to loose too much to said "pirates" is just too much. a real pirate wouldn't have interest in constantly killing the traders he needs to rob goods from.

The game would need deeper mechanics giving pointless murderers a REAL heavy downside and a bad time. While pirates get treated a bit differently. But atm, a sweap over someones innocent shields is already netting you a bounty of 400cr wrorth to be killed by authorities. So you get treated as much as those serial space killer.

 

[Defacto]

if a trader loses one farming machinery he has to trade like 4-5t of said machinery to make the loss of one even. when a pirate only grabs one of said machinery he can generate a profit worth of like 4t of trading.

Goods aren't very cheap, when you consider the money/time ratio of trading.

Does a trader get bounties on their heads for trading? Are pirates protected by law and security? Does a good trader loose more than 20% of all cargo they trade?
The money/time ratio of trading depends on the prices of the goods, which depends on the volume of goods traded. I will profit more as a trader if fat-cat freighters get pirated.
Of course, a pirate should have to suffer from the difficulty of finding illegal channels to sell their goods, as well as having a bounty on their head, something that I would nto have to worry about.

I think that this is especially noticeable right now during the Bacon City CG. There are considerable price fluctuations because of player trade. If there would be systems where shieldless Type 7's would not dare to fly, the mechanics would be a lot different.

And expensive goods shouldn't be cheap. Bulk goods, such as Grain or Biowaste should be cheap. Trading in expensive goods should be a large investment, and risky if you are in a pirate-rich environment.

 

[DaveB]

Limpets and shooting the cargo hatch don't scale up to bigger ships. it's fine for a cobra and under, but the 8-10 you get won't sustain you in bigger ships (asp and above).

Fair point, and I can see why in a larger "pirate ship" you also HAVE to go after more of the bigger slower targets, because those are ones that carry enough cargo that you can demand more and have a reasonable expectation that you'll get it, since your heavier demands are less likely to cause the trader such a loss that it will take multiple runs to recover from. Pouncing on haulers simply won't pay the rent for you.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

Does a trader get bounties on their heads for trading? Are pirates protected by law and security? Does a good trader loose more than 20% of all cargo they trade?
The money/time ratio of trading depends on the prices of the goods, which depends on the volume of goods traded. I will profit more as a trader if fat-cat freighters get pirated.
Of course, a pirate should have to suffer from the difficulty of finding illegal channels to sell their goods, as well as having a bounty on their head, something that I would nto have to worry about.

I think that this is especially noticeable right now during the Bacon City CG. There are considerable price fluctuations because of player trade. If there would be systems where shieldless Type 7's would not dare to fly, the mechanics would be a lot different.

And expensive goods shouldn't be cheap. Bulk goods, such as Grain or Biowaste should be cheap. Trading in expensive goods should be a large investment, and risky if you are in a pirate-rich environment.

reverse question: how hard is it to stay unscanned and uncaught and trade into the blackmarket? It's currently a joke and supereasy. The issue with the bulk goods is, they aren't measured in bulks, they are not even profitable to be traded, why should a trader laod like 200t of Biowaste? you could do a simple missions and it would probably outclass the trading of said bulk goods in profit.
Thats a matter of what is trading good for: only profits.
There is no deeper goal in it, like having to deport Biowaste to make the station return to produce usual goods. And with all the murderers around why would someone waste the chance to trade biowaste and still get shot down. Being a pirate is TOO easy, as well as being a smuggler.
"protected" by law and securty. Seriously, when have both of them ever "protected" an interdicted player properly?

CG as you can see are a bit deeper in their motivation, thats why they work better to cause people trading. This and higher profit of course.

 

[Jordan Cobalt]

if a trader loses one farming machinery he has to trade like 4-5t of said machinery to make the loss of one even. when a pirate only grabs one of said machinery he can generate a profit worth of like 4t of trading.

Goods aren't very cheap, when you consider the money/time ratio of trading.

That just goes into the way piracy is set up. It is very intermittent, profit is high because there's so much downtime between scores. With empty/low value cargo ships, bounty hunters and cops attacking, and accidental killings, the high value is a pay off. Trading's downtime on the otherhand is front loaded. Meaning you search for the routes, get set up, grind it to the ground, and then repeat.

 

[khaitom]

I thought I did. A trader should want pirates for balance, pacing, challenge, and because It's elite in a nutshell, but I guess not many kids like to eat vegetables when they can have dessert all the time.

Limpets and shooting the cargo hatch don't scale up to bigger ships. it's fine for a cobra and under, but the 8-10 you get won't sustain you in bigger ships (asp and above).

Never used limpets. The t9 I shot up a few days ago seemed to drop dozens of canisters, I lost count. It was an NPC and I was testing profitability of pirating them. Loads of money.

 

[Lily from anim.o.v.e]

That just goes into the way piracy is set up. It is very intermittent, profit is high because there's so much downtime between scores. With empty/low value cargo ships, bounty hunters and cops attacking, and accidental killings, the high value is a pay off. Trading's downtime on the otherhand is front loaded. Meaning you search for the routes, get set up, grind it to the ground, and then repeat.

from a single pirate pilots point of view, yes maybe, not from the traders points of view. because the balace is off, it snot like 10 traders per pirate, it currently feels like 4 murderers and 3 pirates /trader. And this is where the issue lies.

 

[Lucifer Hate]

And how are traders meant to know you aren't just a player killer before deciding to throttle down?

If I throttle down, the vast majority if times I get bolwn up.
If I boost and run, the vast majority of times I survive.
You, as they say in America, do the math.

While pirates are indistinguishable from PKers, and both pirates and PKers can fly around with no bounties and no risk, this conversation will crop up again and again and be just as pointless.

Some pirates seem to want to turn the game into Euro Tax-collector Stimulator. Every 5 trade runs the trader waits for you in supercruise to be interdicted and give away x% of their cargo for nothing. No risk, no danger, no fun. Brilliant.

Traders should be able to run, fight back, or even escape without being put on a "kill on sight" list if piracy isn't going to just deteriorate into the 'excitement' of mining rocks that don't bother to fight back.

I remember when piracy in ED meant disabling your victims drives and shooting out the cargo hatch. Why are pirates now insisting it's jetison free gold or die?

A few days ago there were 2 of us pirating in a wing and unfortunately a couple traders had to go to the rebuy screen. It was not that we wanted to kill them but alot of times when you try to target subsystems it happens. The problem is you have so short of a time to disable a ship and they know this. Many times the complainers are ones that ran and were killed for not complying. So what are we supposed to do but use the options available to us. If I cannot disable a ship then I prefer it be destroyed than just sit back and allow it to escape

 

[Sandmann]

from a single pirate pilots point of view, yes maybe, not from the traders points of view. because the balace is off, it snot like 10 traders per pirate, it currently feels like 4 murderers and 3 pirates /trader. And this is where the issue lies.

... and this goes back to the lack of real consequences for being a murderer or pirate, and the huge risk vs minimal reward for being a trader in open.

- Why wouldn't you be a murderer if you're inclined to be a pirate, since there's no real problem with it?

- Why would you trade in open when you can trade in solo/group, when there's no motivation to take the much higher risk?

Changing either one without the other won't fix it:

- if there's real consequences for being a murderer but it's still better to trade in solo/group there's no targets

- if there's no real consequences for murder it doesn't matter how profitable trade in open is coz you'll still eventually lose it all

It would take BOTH real consequences for murder AND increased reward to offset the risk to make it viable to trade in open and thus give targets to pirates... which would be great for the pirates who want loot and the traders who want to profit, and not so great for the pirates who want to be player killers.