Piracy

[Guest]

I've been thinking about this for a little while now. Piracy is, quite easily, the most popular thing in the game. Majority of the players in this server are, or have unlawfuls, of multiple kinds. Obviously, there are metagamers out the arse recently, pirating for 'profit.' There are some fair players who do it too, but who's gunna pass up 500k for not dieing? you also get a nice conversation about it.

My main issue with this is that there are WAY too many pirates at times, to the point that trading can become far less profitable, and even unprofitable to attempt.

There's been some very heavy talk about 'fairness' in the game, much of which is by Jihad Joe. I completely agree, that the game should be able to be made fun for others, both through combat and means of RP.

My issue is with fairness dealing with Piracy/Policing. Piracy is getting used to make money, and is sapping it from other people unfairly to do so. People are even going OORP to get a few bucks. This pisses me off, badly. I don't want to lose half the money I make in a run just because -you- want a new armor upgrade, or a new gun, I really don't care. The aspect of the game is leeching away from other's work to fulfill themselves.

Policing, though, is sort of an iffy subject to me. Police intercept a drug smuggler, and, obviously it would be RP to force the drop of cargo and fine them. What if you just made them drop half the cargo and 'Rped' that all of the detected drugs were dropped? Or if a Xeno catches an importer, they -have- to make them drop it all?

1. I have the unfortunate displeasure to say that I have run into certain unnamed Junkers who were caught undocking from a Council Base. Whom I gave the opportunity to bribe me away from reporting to other Royalists that they had been caught suspected of aiding the Council. It was a mere 100k tax. They refused.

2. This topic is a double-edged sword so to speak. On one side, you have Lawfuls who are sick of all the powersmugglers (especially those who pass Alaska as a Shortcut), -always- carrying full loads of contraband using the biggest, most identifiable ship as a smuggler, a pirate train.... So whenever they're caught, they're ordered to drop all of it. If you want to RP that only -some- of the contraband was found. Get smugglers to use the Firefly, a ship who's RP is that it has a hidden cache.
Alot of these smugglers, avoid RP wherever possible, staying silent as the cruise-ram the mooring fixture, even if caught.

On the other side, you have Pirates who are sick of traders taking routes that lead them through, to, or past one of their other-wise hidden bases. You also have traders who are equally sick of always being pirated when they're just trying to earn a little money for some RP they're wanting to do.

3. My points in 2 lead into this point, and is the only reason i list it here. Generally, people -only- trade in order to fund the RP of other ships in their possession.
Very few people actually want to take weeks to earn 100m through the RP of a trader.
The Trade changes that came with 4.85, while some were necessary, does nothing but force people to powertrade more and longer. In addition, now, not even Smuggling will net you more than 10k per second
Note: The numbers I list as ## Per Second are whats listed in FLCompanion for a 5000 cargo ship.

On my Gallic Bounty Hunter (Gallic Lawful, possible player faction in the making), I'v also been known to pirate. And as part of being fair in respect to roleplay I generally go by this:

Gallic Corp:
40-50 : 50k
50-60 : 125k
60-70 : 500k
70+ : 1m
If attacked during piracy, force it into surrender and increase tax by 50%

Junker:
40-50 : 100k
50-60 : 250k
60-70 : 1m
70+ : 2m
If attacked during piracy, force it into surrender and double the tax

Sirian:
40-50 : 200k
50-60 : 500k
60-70 : 2m
70+ : 4-5m
If attacked during piracy, force it into decompression

Why the different rates for different groups?

Gallic Corporations are for better or worse, Gallic Citizens(/roleplayers) this means they should be hit the least by lawful piracy.
Junkers, while they are Gallia's spies. A number of them are Sirian-Born and ""don't know where there place is within Gallia"", so they are given a medium-rated tax.
Sirians, quite obviously, get the harshest treatment of the three groups. Being that Gallics despise Sirians for their betrayal in Sol, hatred that has carried from generation to generation. For one to be allowed to pass a Gallic Lawful (who -would- allow them to pass, since Navy won't take bribes that leaves GRP aligned as who can be paid for passage) it'd be a pretty hefty price. One worth the risk of being caught allowing said Sirian to travel Gallic Space, but also one that would tell the Sirian they are not welcome