"Cut your engines or I'll open fire!"

[Izu Riekon]

Reading over these replies, it seems a vital component was missed. Time. That is the reason short 1, 2 or 5 word demands originate (other than pure laziness).

The time it takes to issue the demand while the trader futilely attempts to escape. The time they realise they aren't getting away and mash the keyboard with their fingers in a belated attempt to communicate (often resulting in spam of control keys). The time they are about to lose if they blow up, probably the last 30 mins of game-time. Some players know how to take advantage of the time, attempting to run while the pirate is mid-sentence in his grammatically correct RP, punctuation and all. This results in half-sentences of RP often followed by "WWWWWWEEE" or something similar. Not really satisfying for anyone except the pirate's pewpew feel-good value.

SUGGESTION:
Have a minimum time on an RP encounter, say 1 full minute. If you get CD'ed, you have 1 minute to respond, if you try to flee during that minute, you forgo the "grace period". This would ensure a number of things. Good quality RP. The "fight or flight" response and heartrate of the transport pilot slows enough for the player to make a rational decision (and might actually respond with some RP of their own - imagine that!).

---