Fixing Piracy

[Curios]

Well, you're right here, but I was using the term in the mean of exactly combat encounter. Let's call a none combat encounters between players an RP-encounter.

[Lythrilux]

nothing can be done until pirates realize that player piracy is purely an rp/pvp event with little profit in it, as it should be.

I actually make all my money from cargo piracy and normal piracy. It's profitable if you know what you're doing.

Profit is the drive behind the majority of the activity.

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[Curios]

@ curios You're right. it can, as I've stated, also be an RP encounter.

If you think about it for just a second, traders make money off the game, an "infinite" resource that does not require effort or compromise on part of anybody else. So suppose a trader makes 20mil an hour. In doing so, he is generating 20 mil for the Disco economy, 20mil that wouldn't have existed otherwise.

A pirate's earnings however is entirely dependent on the trader. Pirates make money off traders, and when a pirate earns, a trader loses. So in order for a pirate to continue earning, traders must be willing to continue losing. Of course, the punching bag experience isn't very fun, so most traders will avoid getting pirated whenever possible.

There is no way to buff piracy without punishing traders, and punishing traders isn't very good for the disco economy.

Well, everything is cool but the statement I marked - trader won't be willing to lose anything any time. His game is to make cash for things he wants. Trading is the easiest way to do so and fastest as well - so piracy is a parasite on that activity - not a two-sided agreement to hand cash over.

[Tutashkhia]

At first, hello you all. Hope you're doing well.

Then, we should face the fact that the Disco is dead itself. Not only piracy or trading. You keep repeating "Back in days...". I did play that time. But when we (groups of pirates,such as Jokers, Indians, RR...) saw there were only 80-90 people online we simply stayed near one of our allied base and spent time chatting with each other,saying jokes, or whatever it was. But that wasn't a huge problem, because in a few hours or minutes server would be full and the so-called nostalgic piracy was started.

Let's see what we got today. I would never pirate in a place like Liberty if the server had more people online. When I log in and see only ~90 players ingame, from whom 20% are in Connecticut,another 20% are in Penny from whom the majority are with low ranks or newbies. 40% of players are scattered in the whole sirius: some of them in Gallia, too few of them in Bretonia,Sigmas,Omicrons and wherever else,where no pirate would try to chase after,or camp. And the last 20% (ever fewer) are flying near New York,with some catchy ranks. When I see that I surely prefer logging my pirate char in Liberty and try to pirate something. What's about those who are after pews. Man, com'on. There have always been such pirates. Let's say all of them in the History of Disco where such people. If I only stood by the lane and waited hours for some traders,from whom the majority don't even say a word, I would get surely bored.

There is a line for pirates. It starts with your undocking from base. Then you move to your destination (Trade lane, Jump Gate or whatever it is) and start piracy. Then you encounter someone and rob him. Then that guy will complain about you to the lawful. Then that lawful spams in Skype chat that they've a pirate in system. Then the whole lawful fleet logs and moves to you. And the last thing on that line is whether you leave the space or fight. The real pirate isn't the one who follows the words of cops. So you've to fight.

That's the scheme of piracy, which has never changed. It was same back in that nostalgic days. But the difference is that, back in that day you would manage to pirate some more traders before the whole lawful fleet surrounded you. But now, if you are too lucky you will have a chance to stop and rop one or two traders before you get shot.

Finally, I would like to ask a question to those who say that "Piracy is dead and they're only after pews". Imagine this game without pews. Image you had been saving up money and finally managed to buy a lawful ship. But you've nothing interesting to do with it. Just patrolling,patrolling and patrolling, without even encountering any single pirate who doesn't follow your orders and doesn't leave system when you order so. Tell me,what will you feel? A satisfaction?

And what's about the ways which will help us solve "piracy is dead" problem... I agree that Scanners should be changed. Jump Gates should not be so damn strong. And Jump Drives should be removed.

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Tutashkhia Reports

[Curios]

When someone say piracy is dead he dosen't mean it's dead like, very dead - not breathing, no heart beating. Well, you still can try to pirate - but it's not a massive activity any more because it became too problematic to success in. I was trying to pirate and got some cash, yes. But then I was trading and know what? I didn't even met a single pirate party while flying same route for hours. It's incredibly boring. It used to be more challenging to plan routes and constantly be cautious for possible threat ahead of you but now you can literally trade while watching some movie and do exactly nothing to avoid pirates - they are not around anymore. And that's the problem.

I say again - for me at least, while even playing a trader, it was much more fun to have pirates sitting on every corner so you had to actually play the game and do your best and use your best experience to fly around with an attractive cash bag.

And you're saying "piracy is fine", no, it's not fine for sure.

[sindroms]

At first, hello you all. Hope you're doing well.

Then, we should face the fact that the Disco is dead itself. Not only piracy or trading. You keep repeating "Back in days...". I did play that time. But when we (groups of pirates,such as Jokers, Indians, RR...) saw there were only 80-90 people online we simply stayed near one of our allied base and spent time chatting with each other,saying jokes, or whatever it was. But that wasn't a huge problem, because in a few hours or minutes server would be full and the so-called nostalgic piracy was started.

Let's see what we got today. I would never pirate in a place like Liberty if the server had more people online. When I log in and see only ~90 players ingame, from whom 20% are in Connecticut,another 20% are in Penny from whom the majority are with low ranks or newbies. 40% of players are scattered in the whole sirius: some of them in Gallia, too few of them in Bretonia,Sigmas,Omicrons and wherever else,where no pirate would try to chase after,or camp. And the last 20% (ever fewer) are flying near New York,with some catchy ranks. When I see that I surely prefer logging my pirate char in Liberty and try to pirate something. What's about those who are after pews. Man, com'on. There have always been such pirates. Let's say all of them in the History of Disco where such people. If I only stood by the lane and waited hours for some traders,from whom the majority don't even say a word, I would get surely bored.

There is a line for pirates. It starts with your undocking from base. Then you move to your destination (Trade lane, Jump Gate or whatever it is) and start piracy. Then you encounter someone and rob him. Then that guy will complain about you to the lawful. Then that lawful spams in Skype chat that they've a pirate in system. Then the whole lawful fleet logs and moves to you. And the last thing on that line is whether you leave the space or fight. The real pirate isn't the one who follows the words of cops. So you've to fight.

That's the scheme of piracy, which has never changed. It was same back in that nostalgic days. But the difference is that, back in that day you would manage to pirate some more traders before the whole lawful fleet surrounded you. But now, if you are too lucky you will have a chance to stop and rop one or two traders before you get shot.

Finally, I would like to ask a question to those who say that "Piracy is dead and they're only after pews". Imagine this game without pews. Image you had been saving up money and finally managed to buy a lawful ship. But you've nothing interesting to do with it. Just patrolling,patrolling and patrolling, without even encountering any single pirate who doesn't follow your orders and doesn't leave system when you order so. Tell me,what will you feel? A satisfaction?

And what's about the ways which will help us solve "piracy is dead" problem... I agree that Scanners should be changed. Jump Gates should not be so damn strong. And Jump Drives should be removed.

Right, I will drop my two cents here. Mind you, everything that I am going to say comes from my encounters with you and your buddies.

Let's see what we got today. I would never pirate in a place like Liberty if the server had more people online. When I log in and see only ~90 players ingame, from whom 20% are in Connecticut,another 20% are in Penny from whom the majority are with low ranks or newbies. 40% of players are scattered in the whole sirius: some of them in Gallia, too few of them in Bretonia,Sigmas,Omicrons and wherever else,where no pirate would try to chase after,or camp. And the last 20% (ever fewer) are flying near New York,with some catchy ranks. When I see that I surely prefer logging my pirate char in Liberty and try to pirate something. What's about those who are after pews. Man, com'on. There have always been such pirates. Let's say all of them in the History of Disco where such people. If I only stood by the lane and waited hours for some traders,from whom the majority don't even say a word, I would get surely bored.

And yet, you did. But you weren't pirating, were you. No, you took your broken gallic tech'd pirate gunboat to sit above Manhattan and taunt lawfuls. You speak as if you log Tushkie for piracy. I suggest you stop.
You know full well that piracy is not about sitting in the most active system to catch traders, since you are guaranteed to be cought by the lawful forces. You know that. That is why you go there in the first place.

There is a line for pirates. It starts with your undocking from base. Then you move to your destination (Trade lane, Jump Gate or whatever it is) and start piracy. Then you encounter someone and rob him. Then that guy will complain about you to the lawful. Then that lawful spams in Skype chat that they've a pirate in system. Then the whole lawful fleet logs and moves to you. And the last thing on that line is whether you leave the space or fight. The real pirate isn't the one who follows the words of cops. So you've to fight.

Yes, and that is why you relocate, even if it is just one lane down. You move around as a pirate, you do not camp the same spot just because of the fact that a trader will tell the lawfuls of your location. Also, as far as Tushkie goes, the whole fleet logs just to remind you that you do not take an essentially broken Asco gunboat to Liberty, where it has no reason to be in the first place. Saying that you pirate a guy and the lawfuls come get you is like complaining about the cold from eating icecream. It is to be expected and part of the piracy fun is to avoid that.

But now, if you are too lucky you will have a chance to stop and rop one or two traders before you get shot.

Again, that is the point of piracy. See how much damage can you do before you get caught. And see how much you can keep on doing, while the lawfuls try their best to pin you down.

And what's about the ways which will help us solve "piracy is dead" problem... I agree that Scanners should be changed. Jump Gates should not be so damn strong. And Jump Drives should be removed.

Technerf should be reinforced more regarding gallic and sirian tech mixes.

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PSA: If you have been having stutter/FPS lag on Disco where it does not run as smoothly as other games, please look at the fix here: https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...pid2306502
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[Thyrzul]

Of course, the punching bag experience isn't very fun, so most traders will avoid getting pirated whenever possible, hence piracy isn't a sustainable method of income.

The "punching bag" experience causes problems only to those who fail at trading, thus every little credit earned is important to them. If you know how to make a billion a week, not even a little should it hurt you to pay the occasional 2 mills for a pirate. It is up to the trader to keep their dislike inRP or get to hate piracy ooRP too.

There is no way to buff piracy without punishing traders, and punishing traders isn't very good for the disco economy.

As a trader I say maybe it's time to punish traders, the economy is already running well enough.

Let's say all of them in the History of Disco where such people. If I only stood by the lane and waited hours for some traders,from whom the majority don't even say a word, I would get surely bored.

Let's say... but why? That you, as a pirate, find piracy boring is one thing. That you might look for an actual pew-oriented and not piracy-oriented ID is an other. But I don't think your personal experience determines the mindset of the whole Pirate ID-using playerbase.

The real pirate isn't the one who follows the words of cops. So you've to fight.

The real pirate, depending on brain capacity and mindset, can either ram into battle for gloreh, and die with honor, or weight it's chances in light of the situation and might decide to save it's own hide and return later to continue his business safe and sound. So you've to flight, or flee.

Finally, I would like to ask a question to those who say that "Piracy is dead and they're only after pews". Imagine this game without pews.

Right to the point. Having pews, and being only after pews are two vastly different things.

First case can occur when, as would be expected from a pirate, you go for piracy, fly up to the lanes to milk the occasional cashcow, and when authorities arrive, you try to save your skin one way or the other, fight or flee.

Second case usually occurs when, despite being a pirate, you don't care about piracy, don't want to tax traders passing by, you are only to waste a ship and some ammo and mines for the sake of taking down a few lawfuls on the run.

Now, those who say "Piracy is dead and pirates are only after pews" seem to view the situation quite accurately if pirates really don't care about piracy anymore, and go "only after pews". Such people don't find combat problematic, they find the mindset problematic, the one ignoring piracy... while claiming to be a pirate.

I hope this cleared up some confusion so in the future you won't mix these two things.

Oh, seems sindy ninjad me a bit at this, I'll post it anyways.


Now, to my comment...
Discovery having it's playerbase count decreasing slowly resulted in a need to have players more condensed in order to keep the chance of interactions on a level, and somehow some people thought that shrinking systems would be a good way to solve the issue.

Thing is, players aren't distributed equally within a system, they are mostly concentrating around junctions and pathways, meaning mostly lanes, jumpgates, jumpholes. Now, if you only shrink a system, all you'll have are junctions being closer to each other and pathways being shorter. Where will this lead us? 30k-60k lanes. Pair this with buffed transport survivability, and you'll have less pirates and more threads like this one.

However, if you keep system sizes as huge as before, but take a few pathways away, traders will be restricted to more bottlenecks without shortening trade lane lenght much. Less lanes to pick from, more chance that traders pass at the one you're taxing, and more distance from bases.

I believe that this is also a part of the problem (besides buffed traders and wrong mindsets for both pirates and traders) which we need to adress in order to find a proper solution.

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[Curios]

@Thyrzul , well, I'd say it depends on what do people mean by "shrinking the universe".

- If this means that systems becomes small then it's not good. (retard scanners already made systems to be very small)
- If this mean removing useless systems that are here just to waste space - then it's very good, indeed. The problem of trash systems was here long enough to annoy everyone.

[Thyrzul]

As you may or may not have noticed, I was talking about shrinking systems, not the whole universe. I guess that excludes their removal.

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[Curios]

Then yes. But I never heard about shrinking systems idea, only about shrinking the universe one.