Okay, I was shown something that some people may consider ludicrously going off the lore, it is yet another under the desk ceasefire treaty between two factions that should be mortal enemies. Now, that is irrelevant and I ask everyone to refrain from discussing the treaty itself, what I consider more of an issue is the reasoning which was used to make the deal materialize.
The assumed lack of support from the military.
I keep noticing how players (usually traders and miners) constantly demand to be protected by the military forces of every House and go as far as labeling the military force of that certain house incompetent for not being able to constantly, 24/7 be available to assist them.
To all those who feel that their enterprise is endangered by the 'incompetence of the military', let me give you a comparison on how the 'good guys' and the 'bad guys' operate:
Ore fields are static and usually filled by extractors. These are the hot zones for pirates since a catch there is pretty much guaranteed. All a pirate needs to do is log on, fly into the field, cause some pain and disappear.
Takes ten minutes at most.
A military force, usually consistent of players with an equal time window, an hour or two a day at max, cannot know when that pirate decides to fly in and disappear with the catch. It is the military's job to patrol, but it is impossible to cover dozens of the systems at the same time as well. It is also possible (especially in Liberty) that the military is occupied with something else and cannot split into two to assist you in your personal needs.
So, if we consider that a military faction is consistent of people who have real lives and a limited time window, just as much as pirates do and a player base probably equally small, why are they still requested to maintain constant surveillance over dozens of systems when it is impossible?
Why do even experienced people use the reasoning that the "government/military/police" does not support them to achieve their goals , even though we do everything in our power to do so as an addition to our support being canon/lore?
[color=#FFFFFF]The power of every military, in-game, is limited. Constant surveillance is impossible.
Yet, how can we express our support so everyone is happy and they feel supported by their military? Please, I'm all ears on ideas.
(Note: Military =/= RM, I'm talking about all military forces.)
What are the workers, that are constantly threatened by robbers/pirates (in case of FL) supposed to do when its obvious that the military (more likely police) cant do anything to help them? Are they supposed to just take that and continue living their merry lives knowing that the same thing will happen tomorrow?
I know constant surveillance is impossible, but, the workers know that as well obviously. So in a desperate act, they replace the feeling of security from "surveillance" by another form of security, namely the security offered from the robbers themselves.
@Smokey: No, the thing is, it is game mechanics/real life preventing us from providing the workers constant surveillance, factors that are not part of the Disco reality.
Obviously house militaries in most cases are more numerous than pirate forces and they should be able to provide some degree of support in the case of say, mining fields. Yet, currently it is impossible for us to dispatch patrols/platforms/security to fields that are there all the time.
All I can do (and already do) is instruct my men to check the mining fields first every time a patrol is made, so it should mean that the military has the canon, in-RP manpower to provide some degree of support.
Yet, what seems currently is that we provide none at all, because there is no constant presence to make our support apparent. That is why I ask of alternatives.
@Kupo: As I said the treaty is irrelevant. I'm discussing the reasoning here.
You asked for the job of the Military, and I gave it you in one bitesized sentence that even the simpliest of military players could understand and follow to the letter!
Well, military forces main job isn't to patrol lanes anyway. They fight wars. Of course, when there is no battle, they can do that as well. But it isn't their primary task. Same, but not completely related with LSF. Even there is some LPI and LN around, first person people ask help to is LSF. Got many traders asking me to get to Cortez and escort them to New York, and when the answer was no, they start trowing insults, like we're not doing our jobs or something.... It would be completely out of my roleplay to do that, same with military. The police usually takes care of that, even if sadly is highly inactive...
The main cause of police factions inactivity are probably the crappy shiplines and the fact the military can do exactly what the Police can do, with better ships.
Rogue_91, I understand your point and it may have been incorrect of me to use the term 'military' instead of 'law enforcement agencies', but even though that lore-wise the Police is supposed to be handling issues, that is not really applicable in actuality exactly because of the factors you mentioned.
Despite that, if it would be the police watching over miners, my points still apply I believe, except that even the technology of the police is lower grade than that of the pirates. EDIT: As mentioned by Nekrataal.
I'm still waiting for a response on my question by the way.
