Preventing Piracy

[Fizzlefuse]

I think there will be no way to 100% prevent pirates.

I think that the safest way to operate is to slide your PvE-PvP slider all the way to PvE, never leave hi-sec space, arm yourself to the teeth and always fly with an escort. Even in high-sec space I think there's still chances of pirate attacks as space is really really big. (PC)Pirates would probably learn UEE navy/Advocacy patrol patterns so don't think you'll be completely safe. 

This also goes for whatever sector of space Imperium considers their territory, it's simply too big to fully secure and some people will take the risk.

Now, to me sticking to high-sec with a group of fighters all the time doesn't sound all that fun and I'm sure that personally I will jump into medium-sec space (if there is such a thing) with my Hull B, and I'm sure I'll find someone to escort me.
 

[Johnny Holiday]

Piracy is a fated to be doomed concept, IMO. Sure, some our members will end up paying more of the bill then others, but pirate organizations have one major flaw. They often value military strength before economic strength. And Ships don't fly without Cash, not for long, and certainly not well. I think even the most successful pirates will be pretty far behind the curve from an established and an economically well rooted organization. They'll be most effective at release, and only get weaker from there on out.

I mean, will we collectively and individually take loses? Sure. But it boils to that old Vietnam quote “You will kill 10 of our men, and we will kill 1 of yours, and in the end it will be you who tire of it.”. Even in a Pirates best day, one of their ships is certainly worth more to them then a few of us to ours. IMO, I think the key is purchasing power and a righteously vicious campaign against the larger pirate organizations. Desecrate their community altars, ruthlessly destroy their flagship organizations, make them sing songs of the horrors of thieving from Imperium.

The more effective PvP ones will get the hint. Or they wont survive, either way. Wont be attacking our ships.

[Swiftsure]

7 hours ago, Johnny Holiday said:

The more effective PvP ones will get the hint. Or they wont survive, either way. Wont be attacking our ships.

Sure, but 90% of ships will be NPC. And since piracy is an official player "career" I'd assume there will be dumb npc traders essentially customized to be robbed by player pirates the same way we currently see dumb npc pirates that mostly exist to be killed by good guy players in the PTU patrol missions. So I definitely believe CIG will make sure dark side players can earn a decent living pirating, and most their victims will be npc. Same as all other pew-pew careers, but different npc faction standings.

So presuming the pvp-ers have already filled their coffers reasonably on npc you still have another value unfulfilled, their position on the killboards. Bragging rights, competitiveness, area control, feeling of superiority, or just good old boredom will drive them to attack player characters. Because for the pvp mindset shooting players isn't always a means to and end so much as the actual end itself. 

They simply just want to pew-pew other players. And they think SC is just CoD in space. They think all the gameplay CIG creates is just grind to afford pvp. If you tell them you enjoy the trade/salvage/exploration stuff they will just stare blankly at you, because to them it's just grind. They don't appreciate the same parts of the game we do. 

But make no mistake, pvp-ers will attack our ships. Many of us will think they do it for no reason, but that is just because in the same way they don't understand us enjoying trading when it's "just grinding to afford pvp" we have a tendency to not understand the way they see games. Their goal is the same as when they play CoD or PS2, it's to get kills. Because to them every game is a pvp game and the goal is to win pvp. They won't be dissuaded from pvp any more than a mountain climber is dissuaded by heights.  

[Jon1812]

4 hours ago, Swiftsure said:

But make no mistake, pvp-ers will attack our ships. Many of us will think they do it for no reason, but that is just because in the same way they don't understand us enjoying trading when it's "just grinding to afford pvp" we have a tendency to not understand the way they see games. Their goal is the same as when they play CoD or PS2, it's to get kills. Because to them every game is a pvp game and the goal is to win pvp. They won't be dissuaded from pvp any more than a mountain climber is dissuaded by heights.  

My goal is to make it so painful to hit my trade convoys that somebody will take one look and say "Eh...I don't want my rating to go down." Better have it and not need it, than need it and not have it. It will undoubtedly cut into my profits, but I will lose less profits to piracy, so I think it will work out in the end. Plus, it starts to give you a reputation if nobody wants to risk taking on your convoys. 

Early on when everybody is still learning, battles will be a numbers game. I plan to win before the battle starts. 

[Jon1812]

33 minutes ago, Turo said:

I think you vastly underestimate the value of the black market trade and the profit margin in product you obtained at very little cost.  Pirates will likely be using a lot of cheap ships to harass cargo haulers and shake down explorers for protection money, etc.  I have no doubt that many pirates will be griefers that grief just for the sake of trolling people. For as long as there have been multiplayer games, there have been jack wagons whose main satisfaction is screwing with other players, no matter the cost.

If we are able to slide from PVP to PVE while in convoy, that will deter player-characters from attacking, but I wonder if they would be more likely to be deterred than the AI, which will likely attack no matter what... ?

In addition to running escort and CAP missions, I look forward to privateering vs. the Vanduul and whatever hostile orgs, however.   Hey, one man's piracy is another's privateering.   

True, there will be a lot of pirate griefers, but I don't think they will be a very powerful force in the verse. The pirates who actually dominate their sphere will be the ones who run their piracy like a business and actually calculate risk and reward. I think the griefers may be an annoyance, but probably not a very big threat. 

As far as the slider goes, it will only make PvP less likely. It won't eliminate it entirely. So even then, convoys will still run into players. I however, plan to have it full to the PvP side to reap the benefits. As for the AI, you may be right. NPCs might be harder to deter than players, when it comes to it...we'll have to see how they end up behaving. 

Who knows? It might be worth it to bring some Reclaimers along with the trade convoys. Maybe pick up some of the salvage from the pirates we have to deal with...

[Johnny Holiday]

4 hours ago, Swiftsure said:

Sure, but 90% of ships will be NPC. And since piracy is an official player "career" I'd assume there will be dumb npc traders essentially customized to be robbed by player pirates the same way we currently see dumb npc pirates that mostly exist to be killed by good guy players in the PTU patrol missions. So I definitely believe CIG will make sure dark side players can earn a decent living pirating, and most their victims will be npc. Same as all other pew-pew careers, but different npc faction standings.
 

That's a really good point about career piracy and it's value on NPCs. We definitely don't know how well it's going to be scaled against economic powerhouses. 

It's strange it's almost more valuable at these stages being reminded about what we don't know, then what we do.

5 hours ago, Swiftsure said:

They simply just want to pew-pew other players. And they think SC is just CoD in space. They think all the gameplay CIG creates is just grind to afford pvp. If you tell them you enjoy the trade/salvage/exploration stuff they will just stare blankly at you, because to them it's just grind. They don't appreciate the same parts of the game we do. 

But make no mistake, pvp-ers will attack our ships. Many of us will think they do it for no reason, but that is just because in the same way they don't understand us enjoying trading when it's "just grinding to afford pvp" we have a tendency to not understand the way they see games. Their goal is the same as when they play CoD or PS2, it's to get kills. Because to them every game is a pvp game and the goal is to win pvp. They won't be dissuaded from pvp any more than a mountain climber is dissuaded by heights.  

And it's exactly that mentality, that fates the majority of pirates into obscurity. I definitely agree that the majority look at PVE as a grind to support PVP. And that's a dangerous resource model. Often with very little focus on sustained operations, pirates tend to grind enough low-skilled PVE to throw the dice in PVP. If it works, they live like kings for a day, and next week are throwing the dice again. It's a life of living for the lottery, IMO.

And I honestly don't believe they pose much a threat to Imperium, on any real scale. As long as complex attacks (organized/pack pirates) are dealt with extreme prejudice, and good SOPS (standard operating procedures) are in place to support against simple attacks (random pirates, pirate NPCS), they'll be annoying but in the scheme of things, hardly dangerous.

1 hour ago, Jon1812 said:

My goal is to make it so painful to hit my trade convoys that somebody will take one look and say "Eh...I don't want my rating to go down." Better have it and not need it, than need it and not have it. It will undoubtedly cut into my profits, but I will lose less profits to piracy, so I think it will work out in the end. Plus, it starts to give you a reputation if nobody wants to risk taking on your convoys. 

Early on when everybody is still learning, battles will be a numbers game. I plan to win before the battle starts. 

 

27 minutes ago, Jon1812 said:

True, there will be a lot of pirate griefers, but I don't think they will be a very powerful force in the verse. The pirates who actually dominate their sphere will be the ones who run their piracy like a business and actually calculate risk and reward. I think the griefers may be an annoyance, but probably not a very big threat. 

As far as the slider goes, it will only make PvP less likely. It won't eliminate it entirely. So even then, convoys will still run into players. I however, plan to have it full to the PvP side to reap the benefits. As for the AI, you may be right. NPCs might be harder to deter than players, when it comes to it...we'll have to see how they end up behaving. 

Who knows? It might be worth it to bring some Reclaimers along with the trade convoys. Maybe pick up some of the salvage from the pirates we have to deal with...

I think you and me read from the same book! lol. Agreed, on both accounts. The better pirates that are dangerous due to organization are trainable, if not containable. The rest are just annoyances. It'd be difficult to guard every single convoy from complex (professional) attacks. It'd be simple to guard the majority of convoys from simple (lone wolf) attacks. It's difficult to track down every single lone wolf attacker and teach them the rules of the land. It's often much more productive to track down pirate collectives and get them on the same page. As you said, risk vs reward.

Search and destroy salvage operations! Thats just salt in the wound. lol.

 

1 hour ago, Turo said:

I think you vastly underestimate the value of the black market trade and the profit margin in product you obtained at very little cost.  Pirates will likely be using a lot of cheap ships to harass cargo haulers and shake down explorers for protection money, etc.  I have no doubt that many pirates will be griefers that grief just for the sake of trolling people. For as long as there have been multiplayer games, there have been jack wagons whose main satisfaction is screwing with other players, no matter the cost.

If we are able to slide from PVP to PVE while in convoy, that will deter player-characters from attacking, but I wonder if they would be more likely to be deterred than the AI, which will likely attack no matter what... ?

In addition to running escort and CAP missions, I look forward to privateering vs. the Vanduul and whatever hostile orgs, however.   Hey, one man's piracy is another's privateering.   

I'm definitely looking forward to seeing some real numbers of this sort of stuff, that's very true. I just honestly don't think piracy will scale even comparably to multi-pronged economic organizations. I just have a feeling it's going to be too small a market to really compete pas being an annoyance. =)

 

[Jon1812]

30 minutes ago, Johnny Holiday said:

I'm definitely looking forward to seeing some real numbers of this sort of stuff, that's very true. I just honestly don't think piracy will scale even comparably to multi-pronged economic organizations. I just have a feeling it's going to be too small a market to really compete pas being an annoyance. =)

Actually, I think that given a few months, maybe a year, some pirate organizations will emerge that are more organized. They may begin small, but if done right, they could really become big. Honestly, if I weren't part of Imperium or planning to be a legitimate businessman in game, I would probably go that route myself. Organized economic activity will be very profitable, but organized crime preying on that activity could do just as well if done right. 
I don't see any major organized pirate activity happening within the first few months of the game, but eventually it will arise. We should prepare for it ahead of time. 

[Irres]

I think some are organized already.  As much as they can be anyway, without knowing PU specifics.  (Same as us or any org)

I think the smarter ones are keeping a low profile.  And yes I agree Organized groups will always have the advantage regardless of which side of the law they are on.

But Piracy needs to be a more profitable than legitimate routes, if only for this reason, if there is no draw to it for economic reasons, then the only people pirating will be griefers, who will earn money with their alt accounts.  The overall game will suffer.  

[Johnny Holiday]

2 hours ago, Jon1812 said:

Actually, I think that given a few months, maybe a year, some pirate organizations will emerge that are more organized. They may begin small, but if done right, they could really become big. Honestly, if I weren't part of Imperium or planning to be a legitimate businessman in game, I would probably go that route myself. Organized economic activity will be very profitable, but organized crime preying on that activity could do just as well if done right. 
I don't see any major organized pirate activity happening within the first few months of the game, but eventually it will arise. We should prepare for it ahead of time. 

 

Definitely agree. I just think they'll always be behind the eight ball compared to well established multi-industry organizations. MIO's attract a wider percentage of the player base, have more stable revenue compared to the lottery system, and a higher average revenue ceiling, and I think for Organizations that can handle it, that's the key to superior economics. Superior economics translates back into superior equipment and consistent maintenance, which for combat pilots is like being sponsored to PvP. ^.^

I do think the smaller MIO's are on a ticking clock though, a 400 player MIO can't toe to toe with an equal sized combat only organization, not without some serious backup. And those are pretty realistic numbers, even now. As for Imperium? Even if it goes completely stagnant from now till launch, trims it's ranks to actives only, I still think it'll be awhile before an intelligent pirate organization flexes in any complex role.

((Researched Orgs for just giggles. 

 Top 5 MIOS

Xplor 11,686

Test 8,000

CORP 5,455

Imperium 3,958

Pitchfork 3,863

Top 5 DPO (Declared Piracy Organization)

Code Genesis 1,160

Sinister Incorporated 583

Overdrive 540

SOLARSI 518

STOAN 291 ))

 

I honestly believe pirates may be scary to the individual at times, but at a community level? Good SOPs and the proper Reputation, the smart pirates will find better and safer quarry, and the lone wolves wont get too lucky. In the end, its a MIO struggle. Pirates are just a bit of extra static. IMO

[Jon1812]

37 minutes ago, Irres said:

I think some are organized already.  As much as they can be anyway, without knowing PU specifics.  (Same as us or any org)

I think the smarter ones are keeping a low profile.  And yes I agree Organized groups will always have the advantage regardless of which side of the law they are on.

But Piracy needs to be a more profitable than legitimate routes, if only for this reason, if there is no draw to it for economic reasons, then the only people pirating will be griefers, who will earn money with their alt accounts.  The overall game will suffer.  

On that note, I don't think we have to worry too much about those ones. Organization aside, there aren't too many organizations I expect to stay together past launch. Much less the pirate orgs. I don't think the level of organization to keep together something like that exists in any of the pirate orgs yet. Right now, most organizations are just social groups, much like our Units. 
Very few of them are organized and those that are may not stay together too long.

You can bring a pack of random wolves together, but without some way to keep them together, they will segment and fracture off into smaller packs and lone wolves. They need a structure that fits their nature. There are some interesting ideas I'd like to look into for specialized privateer groups, that I would really like to try out at some point. If you could create a system similar to how pirates in the past worked, or perhaps like terror cells work today, I think it would gain a bit more traction than a large aggregate organization of pirates/privateers will. 
It should be interesting to see things like these develop. I am highly interested in seeing what the pirate community has to offer. They may encroach on my business, but I think that only adds content to the game. Who knows, maybe we can even harness that pirate revenue through more legitimate streams and take their plunder off their hands?

As for piracy being profitable, it will always be profitable to take by force that which you never spent time to earn. It is just how they go about doing it that will change over time. 

[Johnny Holiday]

45 minutes ago, Jon1812 said:

It should be interesting to see things like these develop. I am highly interested in seeing what the pirate community has to offer. They may encroach on my business, but I think that only adds content to the game. Who knows, maybe we can even harness that pirate revenue through more legitimate streams and take their plunder off their hands?

A loosely translated lesson from one my favorite books, Enders game: It's not until you love an enemy, that you can truly kill it. I firmly believe a healthy understanding of the enemy is always something worth the time and effort. Who knows what treasures the pirate quandary may yet yield, if any at all. lol. =)

[faquarl25]

I have a friend who decided to become a pirate. He joined a group of people (about 20) and they have already started to set up ROEs. They, like most smart pirates, plan on exclusively attacking NPCs because players are much better at flying or having friends nearby. From what I hear, they might be able to make a killing and should definitely be able to make a living. Finally, destroying their ships won't matter because they can keep insurance on them if the UEE doesn't know that they are pirates. 

[BryGen]

It will be interesting to see how the game handles information as far as picking up charted routes of Hull-E's or Orions and being able to tell the cargo. There could be mechanics of hijacking this info if not encrypted or even rogue members sharing the information for money or to an aligned pirate org. On the other side, I can see traps being set with say a Hull-E marked with goods but actually carrying shields, turrets and snub fighters.

 

[Swiftsure]

On 2015-12-08 09:51:14, Johnny Holiday said:

 

I do think the smaller MIO's are on a ticking clock though, a 400 player MIO can't toe to toe with an equal sized combat only organization, not without some serious backup. And those are pretty realistic numbers, even now. As for Imperium? Even if it goes completely stagnant from now till launch, trims it's ranks to actives only, I still think it'll be awhile before an intelligent pirate organization flexes in any complex role.

((Researched Orgs for just giggles. 

 Top 5 MIOS

Top 5 DPO (Declared Piracy Organization)

I suspect many of the skilled pirates will be in small, close knit groups. Large enough to fill an instance on the weekend but not much more. So a 1000 pirates are more likely to be found in 10x100 man orgs rather than one big one. The mindset of these people seems contrary to building large coalitions, but that doesn't mean that makes them less dangerous. In fact large coalitions would probably be easier to find and hit, whereas several smaller ones makes concerted action against them harder. If they are smart they'll be relocating often and only hitting an org once and then moving on to another victim to avoid any one victim to concentrate on them. 

An eye-for-an-eye policy might be a good idea, make sure no one who attacks us goes unpunished, and no slight is forgotten even if it takes some time to get back at someone. 

Concerning some of the other posts above, we need to keep in mind there will be many different motives and modes of what we might term "piracy". The obvious one is attacking us for profit. But there is also attacking us simply to "get kills". There's also the closely related issue of trade interdiction, either directly from someone claiming an area and demanding tolls from passers by. Or from competition hiring "pirates" to muscle us out of a market, or simply hurt us in general. 

[faquarl25]

One issue with the pirates I have met is that they are small close-nit groups with only one or two of them planning to have a reputation with the syndicates to sell illicit goods etc. The rest don't care about their reputation and therefore do not care about dying to a bounty as much as a law abiding person would. So, I would almost say bounties are a waste of time against them. 

Edited December 10, 2015 by faquarl25
Misspelled dying auto-corrected to dieting

[Jon1812]

8 minutes ago, faquarl25 said:

One issue with the pirates I have met is that they are small close-nit groups with only one or two of them planning to have a reputation with the syndicates to sell illicit goods etc. The rest don't care about their reputation and therefore do not care about dieting to a bounty as much as a law abiding person would. So, I would almost say bounties are a waste of time against them. 

Good luck getting ANY gamers to diet, much less pirates! (Sorry, it was just there)

Honestly, I don't think bounties are the best way to go after pirates. It will hurt their reputations, since they will have to rebuild their fame, but I believe that most of the effective pirates would value profit over reputation. You have to hit their profits hard. I mean, to some extent their reputation affects their profits, but I think that strategic privateering or "counter-piracy" is probably the most effective way to hurt them. 

[faquarl25]

Quote

Honestly, I don't think bounties are the best way to go after pirates. It will hurt their reputations, since they will have to rebuild their fame, but I believe that most of the effective pirates would value profit over reputation. You have to hit their profits hard. I mean, to some extent their reputation affects their profits, but I think that strategic privateering or "counter-piracy" is probably the most effective way to hurt them. 

This is a more eloquent way of saying what I was trying to say.

 

PS

Sorry for the dieting. The way to force pirates to diet is to have DRAKE take a leaf out of Boeing's book and make 44 cm seats.

[Riley Egret]

Nice discussion going on but remember that 90% of pirates are NPC, I doubt they can be "dissuaded" to set up shop in "our" sector.

[Johnny Holiday]

On 12/8/2015, 8:19:59, faquarl25 said:

I have a friend who decided to become a pirate. He joined a group of people (about 20) and they have already started to set up ROEs. They, like most smart pirates, plan on exclusively attacking NPCs because players are much better at flying or having friends nearby. From what I hear, they might be able to make a killing and should definitely be able to make a living. Finally, destroying their ships won't matter because they can keep insurance on them if the UEE doesn't know that they are pirates. 

Keep in mind that the insurance mechanic, even if your character survives losing the ship, isn't instantaneous in concept. Just like real world government programs, it takes awhile to get a kickback on it. That's time spent sitting on your hands or risking another ship. ^.^

 

On 12/9/2015, 7:31:01, Jon1812 said:

Good luck getting ANY gamers to diet, much less pirates! (Sorry, it was just there)

Honestly, I don't think bounties are the best way to go after pirates. It will hurt their reputations, since they will have to rebuild their fame, but I believe that most of the effective pirates would value profit over reputation. You have to hit their profits hard. I mean, to some extent their reputation affects their profits, but I think that strategic privateering or "counter-piracy" is probably the most effective way to hurt them. 

 I definitely want to see more on the bounty mechanic, the reputation mechanic, and finished product underworld effect it has on pirates. I think bounties have always walked a fine line between good in concept and bad in execution.

 

2 hours ago, Riley Egret said:

Nice discussion going on but remember that 90% of pirates are NPC, I doubt they can be "dissuaded" to set up shop in "our" sector.

 Very true. A member early in the thread said it best. There's a spectrum of the types of pirates out there. Off the top of my head: NPC Pirates, Lone Wolves, Pirate Packs, and Professional Pirates.

-NPCs will always be a constant threat, and good SOPs on security vs economic operations, will be important to maintain a lack of complacency in that regard.

-Lone wolves also fall into the basic SOP category as NPCS. These are constant threats and noncomplex or "dumb strike" attacks.

-Pirate packs are just slapped together players in slap together ships, trying to get a score. Won't be sporting the best ships in the best shape, and are likely to be disorganized in their execution. I also have a feeling these will be the players who will try and take and hold space, with even a main base. Basic SOP Security isn't a viable solution, on a normal occasion against this threat. Too taxing on resources and manpower to toss a 15 escort ship guard on every damn transport shipment. These may fall into the bounty realm. If that are silly enough to attempt to maintain a home base, then it's a simple military solution of superior ballistic negotiation. For the rest that just scatter to the wind, I think it boils down to our reputation. It gets out we actively and effectively have units that track pirates to the ends of the universe, for a craptastic pirate, makes you really second guess hitting an Imperium ship.

-Professional Pirates will likely be nomadic. Probably a rotation or bookmarked multitude of momentary bases. They'll bed down in a fresh zone, make an organized hit with quality ships and mods, and then most likely pop smoke to another predetermined fresh zone well away from their last mark. They'll be interested in recording big industry bases,  and the less obvious economic funnels based off of player gathered and published intel. These dudes will be harder to find, but will have the consistency of being in a group. More people, larger footprint, easier to find for organized military strikes.

 

[Swiftsure]

On 2015-12-11 at 1:18 PM, Riley Egret said:

Nice discussion going on but remember that 90% of pirates are NPC, I doubt they can be "dissuaded" to set up shop in "our" sector.

True, but on the flip side they have the advantage of being "predictable". Because CIG will design and script them. This means it will be fairly straight forward to figure out what we need to do to handle them. We can say that traveling through sector X you will have 1-2 encounters of 3-5 pirates in A-B ships, and that will telly you what you'll need to bring to be safe. You're not going to get jumped by a carrier battlegroup out of the blue while on a newbie mission to fix a satellite.

Players on the other hand tend to be much less predictable and much more adaptive. You can say a certain ship/fleet build will work great in a certain known mission, you can't say the same when factoring in players. Humans are inherently unpredictable, and also much better at the meta than the devs programming the npc. 

The upside is that humans can be convinced or dissuaded. So by taking certain actions and playing in certain ways we should be able to use our organizational skills to avoid a fair percentage of encounters simply by not being a less inviting target than the alternatives.

[Riley Egret]

2 minutes ago, Swiftsure said:

True, but on the flip side they have the advantage of being "predictable". Because CIG will design and script them. This means it will be fairly straight forward to figure out what we need to do to handle them. We can say that traveling through sector X you will have 1-2 encounters of 3-5 pirates in A-B ships, and that will telly you what you'll need to bring to be safe. You're not going to get jumped by a carrier battlegroup out of the blue while on a newbie mission to fix a satellite.

Players on the other hand tend to be much less predictable and much more adaptive. You can say a certain ship/fleet build will work great in a certain known mission, you can't say the same when factoring in players. Humans are inherently unpredictable, and also much better at the meta than the devs programming the npc. 

The upside is that humans can be convinced or dissuaded. So by taking certain actions and playing in certain ways we should be able to use our organizational skills to avoid a fair percentage of encounters simply by not being a less inviting target than the alternatives.

I agree, I meant more that, regardless of the brilliant ( against PC ) ideas we come up with, the "structural" PVE piracy going around a border area with the traffic Imperium is going to generate will make it impossible to really clear areas from piracy.

[Jon1812]

10 hours ago, Riley Egret said:

I agree, I meant more that, regardless of the brilliant ( against PC ) ideas we come up with, the "structural" PVE piracy going around a border area with the traffic Imperium is going to generate will make it impossible to really clear areas from piracy.

Not necessarily. I think it will be easier to target NPC pirates than player pirates who are doing it right. NPCs don't keep coming back as the same person in a different skin, like players. If you eliminate a couple hundred NPC pirates in a system, the NPCs that replace them may not all be pirates, meaning that you are slowly weeding them out of the system.

[Swiftsure]

3 minutes ago, Jon1812 said:

Not necessarily. I think it will be easier to target NPC pirates than player pirates who are doing it right. NPCs don't keep coming back as the same person in a different skin, like players. If you eliminate a couple hundred NPC pirates in a system, the NPCs that replace them may not all be pirates, meaning that you are slowly weeding them out of the system.

Nah, if us killing npc pirates cause them to go away then the only place the PvE players will have to fight will be in the free-fire PvP systems. Although it would be hilarious if the post mortem of SC was us hunting the npcs into extinction.

But if you look at the recently released 2.0 missions, what are they? Turning observation satellites back on. Why? Because the npc pirates turned them off to "gain an advantage".

So here's some speculation; in the full game we will have pve objects like these. If the pveers are not diligently shooing the npc pirates away then they will move their positions up. Perhaps attack the refueling station? Perhaps set up a stronghold in the abandoned exploration or fps stations and start spawning evermore npc? So if left alone sooner or later they will start posing a severe problem for our traders and require us to send in a pve fleet to spend a week pushing the npc out of all these positions and finally reactivate the satelites. That would be the optimal dynamic universe experience we'd expect a few years down the line. But I don't think you could ever push them beyond the satellites, they'll always be out there nibbling at the edges waiting for the pveers to slack off.

And then on the other side you'd have the pirate players, who'd get missions to go help the npc turn the satellites off. Most the time it'd be npc security v npc pirates, and then a player comes in and tips the scales. But every so often two players would get opposing missions to the same satellite, making it essentially a pvp mission because only one side can achieve their objective and the other one fails. 

So a lot of our anti-pirate activity would be these pve missions to make sure "our" npc faction keeps the upper hand

[Jon1812]

1 minute ago, Swiftsure said:

Nah, if us killing npc pirates cause them to go away then the only place the PvE players will have to fight will be in the free-fire PvP systems. Although it would be hilarious if the post mortem of SC was us hunting the npcs into extinction.

But if you look at the recently released 2.0 missions, what are they? Turning observation satellites back on. Why? Because the npc pirates turned them off to "gain an advantage".

So here's some speculation; in the full game we will have pve objects like these. If the pveers are not diligently shooing the npc pirates away then they will move their positions up. Perhaps attack the refueling station? Perhaps set up a stronghold in the abandoned exploration or fps stations and start spawning evermore npc? So if left alone sooner or later they will start posing a severe problem for our traders and require us to send in a pve fleet to spend a week pushing the npc out of all these positions and finally reactivate the satelites. That would be the optimal dynamic universe experience we'd expect a few years down the line. But I don't think you could ever push them beyond the satellites, they'll always be out there nibbling at the edges waiting for the pveers to slack off.

And then on the other side you'd have the pirate players, who'd get missions to go help the npc turn the satellites off. Most the time it'd be npc security v npc pirates, and then a player comes in and tips the scales. But every so often two players would get opposing missions to the same satellite, making it essentially a pvp mission because only one side can achieve their objective and the other one fails. 

So a lot of our anti-pirate activity would be these pve missions to make sure "our" npc faction keeps the upper hand

I am not saying that there will be a finite number of pirates or NPCs in a system, but rather that CIG won't keep respawning more pirates in an area where we are obliterating them. It doesn't make logical sense. Pirates will migrate to places where it is easier to make a living. If a system becomes difficult for pirates, then they will slowly start moving to more profitable hunting grounds. 

[Switch]

On 11/13/2014 at 6:23 PM, Jon1812 said:

Some of you may already know this, but I am currently working on writing an economic guide focused on the Star Citizen economy. It is meant to focus on general principles rather than specific plans of action, but I am trying to make it as detailed as I can. One chapter that I am currently working on is on piracy and I am hoping you guys can help with input in that regard. I am trying to think of methods to minimize piracy whether through deterrents or incentives, if you guys have any thoughts in that regard, your input would be greatly appreciated. 

I am currently tossing around a few ideas regarding escorts and  bounties, but I can't seem to think of any other effective methods that would help minimize piracy. What do you guys think?

Without knowing what ship(s) you're taking on the convoy taking strategies including specific ships out, I'll take a stab at it.

 

Subject: Minimize piracy.

Looking at the StarMap with large lanes open (Currently) our choices are very limited which in return means escort and or general tactics. 

• Send scout ship ahead able to defend itself encase of encouter.
• Send decoy ship able to out run other ships but able to catch the eye of pirates looking for loot.
• Have a tracker type ship for enhanced radar.
• EWAR ship jump in first disable what he can, with support shortly following or just EWAR in the escort.
• I cannot confirm this, but on a Q&A with Ben Lesnick on Twitch he said the Herald would be able to disrupt radar, as in you could possibly hide your convoy on radar. If so the a Herald. (He might of meant just the Herald maybe now that I think of it more.)

 

 Otherwise I know Convoy for example, long ago, was more of a group of people just trucking together so they wouldn't be attacked by pirates, they're all in orgs just move together as a group to stay safe because attacking one of those groups means you just attacked possibly 20 different orgs ontop of whatever ships they have with them lol.