Pirates?

[gerfand]

Probably Pirates would be a cool addition to ICW...
having a fleets focused on Frigates Spawn, and having a great variety of Fighters and in Land having the same units...

but the great side of Pirates would be:
-Easy to destroy if in small numbers, making them a good foe on adjacent planets on FTGU;
-Good Raiders, while not having a ISD, 12 Frigates and a Venator(or another carrier) would be very Trick on planets w/ less garrison.

[Lord Xizer]

pirates to you too. scabrous pirates! is that our new greeting? Kudos if you guess what that's from

[gerfand]

??
What I mean is, w/ the Raid mechanics Pirates would make sense.

[Lord Xizer]

??
What I mean is, w/ the Raid mechanics Pirates would make sense.

i follow you, just having a joke at your expense. Wouldn't they just be weaker forms of raid fleets though?

[Revanchist]

pirates to you too. scabrous pirates! is that our new greeting? Kudos if you guess what that's from

X-wing: Iron Fist

[gerfand]

Wouldn't they just be weaker forms of raid fleets though?

probably no, because while they lack capital ships, they would try to swarm you, this way a 4 ISD fleet for Imperials could be 12-16 light pirates ships

[tlmiller]

probably no, because while they lack capital ships, they would try to swarm you, this way a 4 ISD fleet for Imperials could be 12-16 light pirates ships

But the script for raid fleets specifically limits it to 5 ships...if they wanted the chance to have 12 ships, they could easily write it in so that the existing RAIDs would have more ships...so the Pirates still come out on the worse end of the stick as the weaker form of RAID.

[Lord Xizer]

X-wing: Iron Fist

Yub Yub to you I say! Right on target

[gerfand]

But the script for raid fleets specifically limits it to 5 ships...if they wanted the chance to have 12 ships, they could easily write it in so that the existing RAIDs would have more ships...so the Pirates still come out on the worse end of the stick as the weaker form of RAID.

well, if is impossible to make a "Pirates only" raid Script, they could get a Raid Commander ship that would spawn other ships, like what happens w/ a certain Imperial Hero (probably Palpatine, I don't remember now).

[Lord Xizer]

so basically making a mini faction without territory?

[gerfand]

so basically making a mini faction without territory?

I was thinking to give them some planets on FTGU GC, like Nal Hutta!

[Lord Xizer]

I was thinking to give them some planets on FTGU GC, like Nal Hutta!

so basically they'd be a much weaker version of the hutt faction of old...I don't see this really adding a vital component, just another small faction that would get crushed underfoot by every other faction and then have magic raid fleet that would still materialize

[tlmiller]

so basically they'd be a much weaker version of the hutt faction of old...I don't see this really adding a vital component, just another small faction that would get crushed underfoot by every other faction and then have magic raid fleet that would still materialize

Yeah, I think the existing RAID fleets are superior.  If Corey & Co. wanted to make it more smaller ships they could change the script so that it increased to like 10 ships but excluded capital ships from the possible selection.  Achieves the same thing as a Pirate faction without the need to code in another faction that's just around to have it's taint handed to it.  At least most of the NPC factions currently aren't cakewalks.

[Corey]

I potentially like the idea of having pirates as raiders (with an altered script so they'd be worth something) and potentially thrown into the mix as the "militia" on FTGU, the problem there is that I'm not sure what we'd be able to give them.

[RogueSignaler]

Just a thought on the Pirates, what if you gave them their own little world, with something minor for income and their only ground building is a super powered cash multiplier to feed them. Then, let them build a fleet, with the bulk of their smaller ships being set as infiltrators so they can move mostly undetected. Leave them with a few larger ship options so they can build defenses too, but set their AI to favor the infiltrator units for offensive

[Phunnyphil]

I potentially like the idea of having pirates as raiders (with an altered script so they'd be worth something) and potentially thrown into the mix as the "militia" on FTGU, the problem there is that I'm not sure what we'd be able to give them.

You could give them some of the Zann Consortium's ships and units. Those aren't used anywhere else in the game, and the Consortium was a criminal faction anyway, so it would make sense for pirates or a criminal group to use them

[Carnivore Jacques]

Just a thought on the Pirates, what if you gave them their own little world, with something minor for income and their only ground building is a super powered cash multiplier to feed them. Then, let them build a fleet, with the bulk of their smaller ships being set as infiltrators so they can move mostly undetected. Leave them with a few larger ship options so they can build defenses too, but set their AI to favor the infiltrator units for offensive

I don't like this idea. Why?

They are criminals more powerful than galactic governments.
They have loads of money.
They are as powerful with one planet as they are with twenty-four.
They have stealth units that can go right past your fleets and attack you anywhere. You can't do anything about this except defend all your planets equally.

This isn't as severe as the Consortium but I could still see it being frustrating.

It's also not that interesting to defeat them. The AI is terrible at constructing elaborate defences and will instead spam whichever unit it likes best. Do you have any idea how boring it is to mow through two hundred squadrons of E-Wings? It's basically this.

[RogueSignaler]

I was thinking of something more like a harassing group then anything, so like the AI would have to be set for high aggression so it didn't horde.
Yes, Infiltrator was a bid notion at best.
Seeing as they are meant to be a pirates group, they wouldn't be trying to hold territory, more just conducting harassment raids on whoever comes near them.
The rest of the AI has loads of money naturally anyway.

[Lord Xizer]

I potentially like the idea of having pirates as raiders (with an altered script so they'd be worth something) and potentially thrown into the mix as the "militia" on FTGU, the problem there is that I'm not sure what we'd be able to give them.

Could you hire them with the diplomacy maybe...similar to Zsinj in Iron Fist?