Megaevent Pirates - Suggestion for Alternative Setup

I think lowering the attack and increasing the speed sounds like a good idea. It's so easy for the player to abuse the event. You can build fast troop transports to outrun the pirates, and put all your research into soldiering, and they actually HELP. They take care of the defenders, all you need to do is stay out of their way and land your superior troops on undefended worlds.

But the first things that need to changed about pirates are:

- Pirates attack minors too (so unfair! lol)

- Pirates don't attack trade routes if you're protected by the wonder (or turns can really start to drag on).

of course, this should be part of the change.

Still my major point is to better reflect the assumed pirate behavior better than it is
currently implemented.

With the proposed changes, pirates would not be involved with politics and war since they would aim for unprotected targets. Still they could be a major pain in the butt if not taken care of. This can be achieved by either making sure they don't attack your assets or by hunting them down once you have the capable ships (fast and decent attack/defense).

I could also imagine that the following suggestion:

could play a major role in how much a threat the pirates pose. If not looked after they could develop into a major game turning factor.

If left unchecked they COULD develop into a major threat. That is not a mega event anymore. Otherwise i like the idea.

Well you need reasonable fast ships to really get rid of them. Depending on the current research level the pirates speed could be determined by AI (but hopefully not faster than possible for races to achieve - see thread concerning pirates now)

Up to that point you could only protect your colonies and starbases.

I support all of your ideas!

Since the AI almost always is behind in speed, I always manage to abuse the event and conquer the best planets of my neighbors... after the event, they have little industry left to defend against my ongoing attacks.

I don't know if the event is supposed to help the weak players.. but I never felt weak when I took advantage of the pirates event!

Hmmm, I did not mean to help the player or weak races with the alternate Pirate behavior. Just wanted it to be more reasonable from a pirate background and differentiate it from the Peacekeeper event.

It should still count as a Mega-Event and force any participating race to adopt their current strategy or else suffer the consequences. Of course this would mean some work in the races AI section too.

Ummm... Nice idea, but I like the pirates exactly as they are right. Interesting thoughts, but I'm all for leaving it alone.

What about this:

Pirates become a minor race you can interact with, except that they don't have planets.
Pirates have a steady stream of income that is enough to buy them additional ships and spies
They gain income faster by attacking trade ships and starbases
They also gain income by placing spies on planets. The side effect of the spy shutting the tile down (corruption, presumably) would be irrelevant to the pirates
The goal of space pirates is to become as powerful militarily as possible... which means being as aggressive in pursuit of income as possible, demanding protection money off of weak civilizations (or special deals with evil ones), and avoiding having their fleets destroyed.

Right now, they're just the dreadlords sans planets and with enough ships to be a problem. Reorganized like this, they could be more of an organized crime syndicate or something along those lines.

Interesting idea... but if pirates dont have planets, where do they get their ships from (that is if they are trying to become as militarily powerful as possible)

Yes, please for the love of God, leave things be. All of us come up with some pretty good ideas from time to time, and yes, I know the devs use our ideas and feedback in their work but come on, enough is enough. We can all remember certain things being 'nerfed' now can't we? Bitch and whine long enough and we might see a bunch of updates that basically detract from the experience. I don't want that, do you? Look at this as my own personal bitch fest with regards to 'game changes' since it was better to reply here than start a new thread on the 'I WANT' mentality.
All in all this game is awesome... it was great the way it was back in the DL days, and the expansion has added so much more. I get tired of reading about spies, and pirates, and mega events. How this should have been done, why wasn't this done, etc.
So for all of you who read this and find yourselves wanting to flame me because you might say that all of these improvements were done based on our feedback, flame away. I gave credit to this community for that and that is the end of it. Yes, our feedback is necessary, but to relentlessly pound away at the devs like a sledgehammer... if you want a game done 'your way' that badly, then learn to code and like the commercial for Devry says, you haven't played the best game out there yet because YOU didn't develop it yet!
To the devs... you guys did a great job, especially in trying to cater to the masses. However, maybe you should start letting people know when their feedback is appreciated... and when it isn't!

They could have "Homebases". It could be like the mothership from Homeworld.(Which is like a, dare I say, carrier. Except it just makes the ships) They could also mine asteroids for more $$$.

Easy there champ! No need to get angry, it just is a flawed event IMO. Esp. If youre a superrace! I think I said this already, but the pirates are invincible if youre a superrace.

well I was not actually complaining. It just came to my mind what pirates, as I remember, are about.

I don't mind if anything gets implemented but I think it's always good to spread new ideas and discuss their implications on the game.

Any discussion will profit the game in the long run. Thanks for the feedback so far and keep it coming

Please forgive my rant... I wasn't aiming towards anyone nor was I implying either one of you was complaining or giving bad input or anything... I just went off a little.
You guys have to remember that for me, this forum is the 'Great Escape' from work, even if it is only for small moments at a time. When I log on here, I look forward to reading what you guys have to say, regardless of whether it has to do with this game or not. Let's face it, you're all entertaining! But to me, lately it just seems like there is an awful lot of space taken up by all of our wants, needs, how this should be, why this isn't... you guys know where I'm coming from. It's just that most of these new features were pretty much asked for by us, the game's community. Now that we have what we wanted, we are asking (or at least adding) for more, IMO. I just don't want to go down that road that we took a few months back when we went from DL 1.2 to 1.3 and then to 1.4... if you remember, we did lose a few things based on 'our' input into the matter (or even our 'boasting' of ways to beat the computer). Add to that the comment Brad dropped somewhere in here last week or so regarding how he uses our posts regarding tactics and whatnot to come up with ways to improve the AI. Believe me, I am all for a challenge, and there's nothing wrong with what Brad does... but eventually, if given the chance, Brad could end up giving us a 'totally unbeatable' AI... and wouldn't that be special?
Load game, message... you are defeated, do not even bother, quit now... game over. Gee, that would be so much fun!
But again, sorry guys... wasn't 'yelling' at any of you.

No prob. I'm just really getting into the game and ideas how to extend the experience, improve perceived shortcomings and so on just keep coming ... I can't help it

ditto, which has the side effect of making me avoid stress at all costs.



weren't you around here when the game first came out? people were downright livid that they had no tactical combat, no orbital bombardment or carriers, that they weren't playing MoO2 basically.



what did we lose? i can't remember disliking any of the changes i observed.



i dare say it would be! that's why there are easier settings. but i don't think it'll happen. i do think we can realistically expect Brad and the other devs to address some of the more persistent AI problems and similar issues, in time. the pirates event can destroy a game, as can the plauge. but mega events in general are fun and enjoyable, and personally i'd rather seem them 'nerfed' then resign myself to disabling the feature all together. but i don't think that'll happen; i think instead the devs will eventually create a better manifestation of such events, or AI that's better able to face them. i like that the game is regularly updated in ways that change the overall gameplay. it keeps things fresh for me.

and i think they're constantly looking for new things to include, in this game and in others, even if they can't do anything more than file them as interesting ideas. i think i understand where you're coming from, though. it can be overwhelming when two dozen different people all say "it should be this (minutely different) way!" my personal rule of thumb when it comes to additions is, (AI aside) if i couldn't do it myself with pen, paper and a calculator (albeit laboriously), i wouldn't suggest it in this game. but that of course is just me.

Wowgh, thanks for the input. This looks to me like a major overhaul, way beyond a (Mega) Event I had in mind

But that's fine, any ideas that stir the developers imagination can only make it better ...

Ahem, stock markets...
Anyone remember those bad boys?

Those absurdly overpowered bad boys that allowed you to boost morale while still increasing your economy?



Thats a good question. They could simply buy them at any race's planet, or perhaps lobby civilisations for a ship contract of some time in exchange for money and/or peace (privateers). Or, as mentioned, it could be more complicated, with pirate home bases starting up under the fog of war (without constructors... perhaps a unique kind of starbase with a factory and military starbase abilities?), where their ships would be created and additional revenue procured. It could be an interesting dynamic... you need to hit the starbases to put a dent in pirate production, and these bases would pop up all over the place as pirate funds allowed, and might be well beyond your reach or jurisdiction.

Personally I'd like to see the Pirates event be as suggested, and then an event like the current pirate event be, say, an extragalactic invasion of some sort. Maybe even just make the pirates event the Dread Lord event and give them a planet.

It'd make sense. The dread lords aren't a threat, but the pirates are, DESPITE their relatively weak ships. If you were to give the Dread lords 10-20 ships to start, plus or minus transports, they'd be the terrors that they were in early DL builds.

I support the idea of making pirates into a special "minor race." It's strange how all civilizations are always at war with something that currently has an only periodic existence.

Like real life though, there should be a "Golden Age" of piracy followed by sharp decline and eventually all but disappear. I would also change civilizations to no longer automatically be at war with pirates. The idea that the entire civilized world collectively came to the agreement that pirates were considered enemies of all mankind came after the Golden Age (I believe the term is "Hostis Humani Generis."

I think their decline should be a player initiated thing. If you let them run rampant, then you've got a crippling crime empire weighing everyone down, with enough power to challenge an entire nation. Systematically crush their bases, and they'll be relegated to the sidelines. They'll always survive, since they don't need a base to survive and they'll eventually get new ones, but they'll be so crippled that they'll be a non issue in galactic affairs. At least, unless you let them build up again.

You could always create a race with big soldiering bonuses and hope they don't have spore shis!

Yea, it sucks now that they don't give morale bonuses.