Piracy

[Valarin]

I personally also ask traders how much profit they make, then make sure that I do not cut into it too much, so that continuing their route makes sense. I do not win anything by making someone log off, or sundive to do the same route again.

I think this is the real core of the matter which many players seem to forget (although, reading so far, I think the other people in this thread already know this quite obvious logic). If you pirate too harshly, then your source of income probably just won't be there next time - and you both lose out in the long run.

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Valarin: Characters & Feedback

[Jack_Henderson]

Sadly jack ooRP hate is implied into the game through piracy. Something which I cannot understand. And logging for the sole reason to make someone's day... well you should feel very bad about this because it is just pathetic.

What you say is not entirely true.

It has 2 dimensions, in my opinion:

> grieving player <=> normal player
> time, experience, and a full bank account


It's not "the pirates" who create oorp hate. That's an over-generalisation.

Time, experience, and a full bank account

The statement often comes from rather new players who still suffer when they lose a cargo load. I can still remember situations from 4 years back. At that time it hurt when you lost 10 millions bc they meant valuable progress.

You will see that over time (give it a few more months) money is not a big thing any more. And with that, you will also see that you spend it more carelessly, and that losing it is actually part of the game.

Yes... losing your money to pirates is part of the game. It would be boring to fly around with no threat of losing what is yours. But getting there takes time, at least it took me quite a while.


Player wanting to grieve you <=> normal player

"The pirate" ™ does not introduce oorp hate. That pirate is a character who has to be bad, who has to treat your trader badly, etc.

The normal player who rps a pirate will not create oorp hate in you, I hope. If he does, you should check your own gaming mentality bc losing/winning is part of any game. The chance of losing what you have is what makes flying around interesting. And: it's very easy these days to make money, it's very safe these days. I would say, piracy was 10 times higher in the past.

The "Player who wants to grieve you" behind a pirate char does introduce the oorp hate. These are the guys that would hit you on a Sair GB in O7 "Drop your cargo", then on a BDragon Cruiser in Honshu "Drop your cargo" and again in Kyushu on a Junker "Drop your cargo". People like that are cases for admins, and you do best by not letting them have an impact on you. I know, this is hard. Collect good material. Talk to others. Play together. Enjoy the good sides of the game. Ignore the bad ones.

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+ IMG| IS RECRUITING: Click to find out more!

[Vredes]

Well I avoided giving examples, but that was what I was talking about. Don't get me wrong I am not poor, I can afford paying the pirate and even more than he demanded if I liked the encounter.

[Jack_Henderson]

Well I avoided giving examples, but that was what I was talking about. Don't get me wrong I am not poor, I can afford paying the pirate and even more than he demanded if I liked the encounter.

Contact me. I am always collecting material.
Don't let those wind you up too much, even though it is hard, I know.

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+ IMG| DISCORD: https://discord.gg/TWrGWjp
+ IMG| IS RECRUITING: Click to find out more!

[Omicron]

I consider (for pirating myself or when getting pirated) 3m as the absolute upper limit before griefing starts.

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[Binski]

I think its all good. I pirate for small amounts, 2 -3 mil, 5 for the biggest ships with full loads of something really valuable like ore etc....

Sometimes I have dry days, sometimes I can get 4 or 5 attacks in, even at 2-3 mil, you can make anywhere between 10-15 mil in a day in just small attacks. That would be a fairly busy day for me though. Mostly, I pirate for the fun and the interaction, but don't mind making a little bit of cash to keep the ball rolling either.

I'd rarely go above 5 mil per head. But, i fly a pelican... in a bomber, if you have the firepower, you can be a little more threatening, and can pull off attacking more than one ship in one instance. Its easier to cover that kind of area in a bomber or freighter, so if you can pull off big group heists, by all means, be epic!

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The Further Exploits of Captain Antares (August 2015) │ (alt) JonasHudson
*Argo | Special Operative ID (Approved Request)* | Argo Compilation Video
################ *Proposed OF Challenge System* ################
############### The Book of Piracy (Piracy Tutorial) ###############
############### Binski Alamo (Youtube Channel) ###############

[Papa Oomaumau]

Think mosquito.
The mosquito survives because it does not consume its food source, but takes a tiny bit at a time, ensuring that the victim is not so irritated as to never return to the area again.
That's a pirate.

Now think bee hive.
The bee hive survives by leveraging overwhelming pain to ensure that the victim never returns to the area again.
That's a military/house/opposition thing.

When pirates stop behaving like mosquitoes, and start behaving like bee hives, that harms not only individual player interaction but the entire gameplay dynamic and lore of the server.

Be the mosquito, my friends.

Also, and perhaps more importantly, as someone who actually trades/smuggles because I prefer it to dogfighting, bee hive pirates feel like their entire purpose is not to enhance the depth of the server and lore, but to harass and waggle their e-peens.
I realize this is my perception, and not always intended, but that's what it seems like to me.

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[SnakThree]

DELETE

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[Narcotic]

I don't care for how much I get pirated. In the end, there's nothing I can do about it anyways. Either you pay or run (and die). You'll always meet people who are going to demand 10+ millions. Of course it's not always that satisfying, but it happens.

Myself I don't like making piracy demands over two millions. Most times I even ask below 0,5 millions as experience has showed, that them traders are more eager to roleplay - even after paying the fee.

I don't pirate for the credits. Got plenty enough. And I don't mind pirates who do rob for the profit.

Cargo piracy however can be quite mean, but it's a rare thing and mostly done in groups.

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[Mímir]

It's only bad to pirate for songs, chats or other immersion-breaking oorp stuff.

Also Jinx, what trader does trade routes that only bring him 5 million credits in profits in this bloated economy? Really...

A pirate might log 10 times, get killed and have to purchase ammo (~500,000 - 1 million credits) each time for each 5 million he robs. It might take him severely longer than 20 minutes, he might have to stroll around a whole bunch of systems to get lucky and so on. He is dependent on another player, the trader, where the trader is solely dependent on himself. Pirates are extremely sensitive to the player count on the server. That makes spreadsheet-exercises pointless for a pirate, whereas trading is like a clockwork - the only variables are server crashes and pirate encounters. *Yawn*

If the trader player thinks that the pirate only spends the 30 seconds it takes to type out "2milordai" to earn credits, well then the trader is too daft - it's the traders own responsibility to figure out how things works.

I can also testify that some people are as reluctant to pay 100,000 credits as they are to paying 10,000,000 credits - quite a few traders refuse to pay out of some weird principle. I've tried to pirate folks that refused to pay 1 million credits, and the next day I've gotten paid 5 million on a lawful character for escorting the very same guy through a few empty systems - some players have a real issue with the piracy aspect of this game on what seems like a deep personal level (maybe it's the epeen thing, that they automatically and incorrectly interpret all piracy as dick waving and then start waving theirs?). Also good luck "rerouting" a powertrader - they know full well that the credits/minute ratio is better if they get killed, respawn and do the specific segment of the trade route over again, rather than ending up with no commodities at some quasi-lawful base in the middle of nowhere.

Another very relevant point of view often left out of these discussions is smuggling or unlawful trading. In those cases, the trader is asked to drop all their cargo... Does that mean that the ID's that call for this (CR, IMG, Police, Xeno etc.) are meant to "abuse" at their core? Why is it malicious to ask for 10 million out of a 15 million profit, when dropping it all is a valid demand for other ID's? People are too focused on "pirates" rather than the mechanics behind these encounters.

From the pirate perspective I think the "good pirate encounter" is something you can only look at a case-by-case basis. There'll be situations where you know that the trader is crying internally as soon as you fire the CD, and in those cases 100,000 or 10,000,000 credits is all the same, all you are going to get is a blue and abusive insults and taunts thrown your way. Then there are other cases where traders negotiate or come up with alternative solutions, these are the encounters I personally enjoy the most because the pirate's actions are reciprocated. Then again there are other cases, where the trader will use structural "excuses" in the form of // (for instance, I robbed a USI on my Xeno and instead of roleplaying he went straight to "//hey xenos and usi are friends, read the faction info page", totally disregarding the fact that a few lines further down that page, it is stated that the Xeno-USI connection is well-guarded secret unknown by most in the lower ranks of both organisations).

The way I like it, the pirate encounter should generally be negative for the characters in question - that is, it has to hurt. The majority of pirate characters aren't do-gooders for obvious reasons. If it is pimped out 5K'er full of ore, 10-15 million credits will hurt that character's finances - and if the player behind the trader gets butthurt, then he needs to calm himself down a little. We all know that credits are so ridiculously easy to come by in this game and all that you can use the credits for is buying useless junk that you are going to play with for a day or two before scrapping them. If the loss of pixel credits really hurt some players on a personal level, they need to toughen up. Personally when trading I have lost more credits by AFK'ing into planets than I ever have to pirates, it's not a big deal at all if people take a minimum of precautions to avoid getting caught.

tl;dr: As long as the trader profits and he gets incentives to keep a larger part of his profits by not acting foolish, a pirate encounter is fine and non-malicious.

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