"It's not the point to kill them all, I can do that with any of my Pirate characters, I just place a 20 mil tax and that's about it.
I don't want to do that."
-> well, thats not possible. i thought that, too. but was shown that one must not ask for outragous amounts to fulfil the rules, even if the roleplay would urge you to "destroy rather than tax".
to add something to the discussion about "what a pirate can do". since i just sort of downgraded Clover to a Griffin ( rather forced than pure choice, its the only LF i can fly as a gaian that is acceptable ) - i tried to review my options as a so called "terrorist - that is practicly a pirate".
so here is the story:
i had to think about it, after i was flying in a fully outfitted Virage after a simple large train with the usual 100k shields. he refused to pay the usual 500k and i opened fire. i had the best possible weapons ( 6x gaians angels ) ... and was some sort of a laughing matter for that trader. a powerbar made me strip half his shields, then i would have to regen, and so did his shields. - i disabled the tradelanes ( we started out little chase at ID-14 ) and i kept disrupting his cruise. now i concentrated a little too much on damaging him, so i used up a lot of bats and bots while he pummled me down with his few lvl4 transport turrets ( wow, those things are tough, when you re not too far from the transports ).
we ended up with me disabling every single lane, keeping him on travel speed, but due to a lack of power ( gaians angels aren t exactly efficient ) i wasn t able to do much more than a few scratches on his hull. all the chase lasted like 20 minutes.... at that time, he redocked at ID-14 again ( somehow we were flying a circle ) - and i retreated to islay with like 5% hull and no bats/bots ( concentrated on disrupting and evading only in the end )
after that... i thought about the term piracy again. in the end, i don t need to destroy a trader maybe, but i can make his flight a real pain by keeping him slow and disabling every single lane. that behaviour might be closer to the term "terrorizing" and so might be closer to what gaians should do. ( again, they are terrorists but they don t go and kill others - it is written, that they terrorized spa and cruise by disrupting their flights - but not by blowing up full liners )
all in all, the rate of success is quite high though. - i think out of 10 transports i engage, 8 will comply and pay up. some haggle - or don t haggle but only put slightly less into the transfer window, - but all in all, most are just fine, even if they KNOW that i can hardly do much but slow down their progress. ( of course you don t get the hardcore traders in leeds - but rather the sort of RPing folk ... compared to sigma-13, i guess )
strengthening up pirates so they can pirate in everything? - no good idea, - it ll cause more reports, cuase people accidently blow traders up. besides, if mercs / BHGs are "unlikely" to hunt in capital ships, pirates are very unlikely to pirate in capital ships. - the maintenaince costs of those ships will be much higher than pretty much anything you gain from piracy. ( and you cannot ask for outragous amounts, just cause you fly something expensive )
what i do not like too much is the thought that traders lead to capital ships. - of course, i know that you are right with that. but as a character, i have to consider a trader to be a trader, not a tool to buy a big ship. ( unless roleplayed that it is the very same person )
so i cannot punish a trader, cause i know that at some time, i might end up with the same player ( but a different character ) in a BHG battlecruiser chasing my little fighter through half of sirius.
right now - pirates, if they are organized in a playerfaction, are strong enough. lonesome pirates lack the power, but thats their choice - and as described above, they have other means to get their cash or make a traders life difficult.
right now, traders and pirates are well balanced, imo. the upgrade of the transport turrets is a good one. even a train can do a serious bit of damage to a fighter if caught unaware, a containertransport can even blow up a gunboat when the gunboat pays not enough attantion. pirates in packs can easily dispatch a trader though.
changing something there may lead to more problems.
edit: a "cap-killing-faction" ? - last time i checked we were a roleplaying server; - i don t think any of the NPC factions would set up a cap-killing-faction... thats a player idea that can hardly be based on any roleplay.