Getting Pirated by a freelancer

[nOmnomnOm]

I am not speaking about Freelancer supporting Pirate because of same IFF. I am speaking about Freelancer supporting Pirate on basis of the fact that he is hired by the latter; the escort aids the payer if payer is fired upon.

Pirate ID cannot hire Freelancer ID. Was I or Drrobe not clear?

Pirate, Freelancer and Miner IDs are generic.

to be fair drrobe was talking about bounty and pirating. Not escorting.

[SnakThree]

Nor is Toris talking about escorting a trade ship. He talked about Pirate ID hiring Freelancer ID. In which case, the rule is clear as it gets.

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[RmJ]

Freelancers suck as pirates anyway. They have no idea what they're doing.

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[The Savage]

He talked about Pirate ID hiring Freelancer ID. In which case, the rule is clear as it gets.

A generic Pirate ID'd ship cannot hire a Freelancer ID'd ship to engage in piracy, nor engage in a "bounty" contract.

1. Pirate ID player hires Freelancer ID player as an escort.
2. Pirate meets trader; Freelancer just sits there and observes.
3. Trader denies demand and tries to fly away.
4. Pirate starts to fire at the trader; Freelancer still sits and observes.
5. Freelancer notices that trader starts firing away at his employer.
6. In effect, Freelancer joins fight against trader, defending pirate.

I do hope you get my point here? Freelancer isn't helping in piracy. He is merely defending the pirate. With upper rule being present, how one's going to say if Freelancer broke his ID or not?

We always could Pirate ID unable to hire Freelancers, but that would be overly punishing and would ditch already nerfed ID into nothingness. We always could try that, but then remove restrictions about House Piracy.

[SnakThree]

So that is essentially Freelancer ID being hired by Pirate ID to assist if and when combat starts.

Pirate ID cannot hire Freelancer ID to be assisted in combat.
Freelancer ID cannot hired by Pirate ID to assist in combat.

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[The Savage]

So, to make it clear for sake of wording:

Combat - when pirate initiates combat, freelancer does not join.
Defence - when pirate is fired upon, freelancer is defending.

Otherwise, Pirate ID cannot hire Freelancer ID at all, according to what you wrote. Drrobe's rule clearly states that Freelancer ID cannot be hired to help to attack trader if the latter refuses to pay. It says nothing about Freelancer defending Pirate.

[SnakThree]

Pirate ID can hire Freelancer ID to ferry stolen good, to scout ahead, to lure someone into piracy encounter. But cannot be hired to participate in combat.

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[The Savage]

This is not what rule says. Escort rules still apply, because Freelancer is hired and acts in defense of his employer. Something is very wrong in here then, because if we followed that rule making defence = combat - which is extension of Rule 4 of BH&FH - every escorting is combat, meaning Freelancer ID cannot help Miner ID or other Freelancer ID despite it being hired by them, due to the fact they are generic IDs.

[SnakThree]

Freelancer ID can be hired to escort as per ID rules that overwrite bounty rules:
Can fulfill any bounty and escort contracts, and may treat transports as combat targets when executing a bounty or escort contract against them.

However, as Drobbe stated, Freelancer ID cannot help Pirate ID in piracy encounters. Arguing that Freelancer ID is hired to escort Pirate ID is stupid beyond reason. If that Pirate IDed ship is ferrying goods or traversing area, then it can be legit. But not while actively pirating as that is essentially hiring to assist in piracy.

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[The Savage]

So it overrides escort rules nonetheless. I'm rather interested, why all of sudden such a change? Otherwise I should be already sanctioned like 30 times for hiring Freelancer and being hired as Freelancer.


If it is a case for sake of balance, I'm all for it. But when pirate can rely on no one else but himself and is not really fair if there's a pirate against bunch of Freelancers and one authority pilot.

We should make certain factions previously hostile or no-dock indifferent to Pirate ID (such as Hogosha or Unione Corse) to counter that sudden change. Otherwise, players will throw away this ID and pick up Outcast ID which allows them the very same thing minus Rheinland and Gallia.