A pirates life for me...

[WhiteHojo]

Well, the Corsair Race had it's initial run this weekend - didn't have as much time to spend on it as I wanted but such is life.

Here are a few of my observations along w/some Qs for the group:

Started the race in a large galaxy (150 systems) on 1 world that was set to poor. Total of 18 races... could only view my own score (believe it or not this makes it more difficult than I thought it would - sucks not knowing what the race you're about to attack has)... all races set to high diff... med bonus... no neutrals...

the Corsairs (to the best of my recollection) had Nat Merch (no space port needed), Pys Tech, Prop exprt, min settings on ground combat, research, reproduction, all resource production & trade... max'd on ship att & ship def, & ship maintence and breathed none on rock...

race had a special Pirate tech that gives access to Machine Shop 1,2,3 (50kt that repairs 1,2,3), Pirate Space Yard 1,2,3 (200kt that builds at 500,750,1000), RetroYard (100kt space yard that doesn't build or repair - only allows the recovery of res from scrapped ships - a rather failed experiment), Pirate Intell center 1,2,3 (produces 1000,1500,2000 intell points), Pirate counter intell 1,2,3 (the only intell project that the Pirate Intell Centr can run w/o researching normal Intell), a Pirate colony ship (150kt hull w/2 engin max) & a pirate rock colony pod (100kt comp w/max cap of 1M)...

Started the game smack in the midd of the map on a small world w/no res above 85% - very little production goin on.

Built a scout ship & did a little exploration. This is where I ran into my 1st role playing test & I'm ashamed to say I failed - found a large rock planet w/no atmo that had 2 tiny moons w/no atmo - ashamed to say I moved my homeworld here - limited my self to building 3 min res mininers 1 org & 1 rad, 1 resup & 1 const - the rest was research & intell...

Anyway, after finding this home (took a VERRRY long time to colonize those 3 planets) I stopped colonizing. Built some Des sized Const Yard Ships, found acouple of systems w/storms and built pirate bases (500kt spaceyard w/pirate SY comp & some wpns - later put stealth armor on it to try to hide it) also built a few remote mining stations (500kt space station w/2 min & 1 each of org/rad) - researched like mad till I got ship capture (tech started on low w/med cost)... then I built some Des sized boarding ships and went a pirating...

found the Darlocks, captured a few - lost all to a dang minefield - built another fleet w/boarding, supply, repair & SY ships - and went in other direction - found a race w/PPBs captured much tech from them - lost a couple of fleets but am slowly making headway -

Played 175 or so turns and moved from Last to high of 8th... It's great fun and alot more difficult than I thought it would be.

the other roleplaying decision I was torn on is whether or not to accpt a races trade & research treaties (anything above that I flat out refused) - I sat back and thought what would a good pirate king do???

I accepted the treaties, of course... at least until I was unable to locate any enemy ships then I'd turn on the partner - brought a rather guilty feeling of pleasure to pounce on the unsuspecting ships of suppossed alies...

Found that once I'd captured the tech level for shield depleting wpn - life as a pirate was MUCH easier -no more slugging it out waiting for those shield to colapse. Also, putting a PPB on each boarding ship helped in those battles where I was outnumbered and obviously couldn't capture them all. Stealth armor was the defense of choice - either captured or researched to Stealth lvl 2 armor - better than shields in my opinion (for the pirate anyway)...

Gotta go - will check back later w/more thoughts... and as always, feedback is appreciated.

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Character is best defined as that which you do when you believe nobody is watching.

[This message has been edited by WhiteHojo (edited 12 March 2001).]

[mac5732]

WHojo, sounds good, you don't want it to be easy. Question, what about using tracter beam along with ship capture or working something out on this. It seems that pirates would use a type of tractor beam to pull in enemy ships, hit victim with tractor beam, pull towards you then board with ship capture or is tractor beam part of ship capture routine? I haven't used ship capture yet so don't know. still experimenting with various things yet,,
Did you make the small worlds colonies or just bases for repair & supply? How did you get tech research, from your bases, planets, or thru liberating them from friend & foe or from all? mac

[Suicide Junkie]

quote:

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I failed - found a large rock planet w/no atmo that had 2 tiny moons w/no atmo

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That's why pirates shouldn't get colony tech. Instead, you'd have to capture a rock colony ship from somebody else before you could move in.

The pirates shouldn't be relying on planetary production, but thievery instead.

Question: Did you have min settings on environmental resistance?

If you have both min env. res. and min reproduction, you require a perfect planet to get any growth at all Makes capturing slaves more important too. Finding a large transport with 500M people means you get to boost production on some planet by 20% or so.

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As for getting Mods/races. My Version hasn't got the latest patch, and I don't have time to redo the mod right now. If you want to quickly get into the Pirate mode, just set every racial trait that affects planets to its minimum value, and the rest is optional.

Ie.
Requirements:
- Research
- reproduction
- enviroment resist
- mineral, organic, radioactives
- trade
These should all be at their minimum setting. The rest is whatever you feel would be good.

Some "almost nessesary" things:
- minimum maintenance (+20%) (or you're making it impossible to win)
- Rock/None race (for the pirate ambiance)

I also recommend:
- ship attack/ defence maxed out. (It helps when you can't miss and you can dodge everything )
- propulsion experts (need speed to get in and board between shots)
- Psychic tech tree (makes capturing easy)

[WhiteHojo]

quote:

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Originally posted by mac5732:
WHojo, sounds good, you don't want it to be easy. Question, what about using tracter beam along with ship capture or working something out on this. It seems that pirates would use a type of tractor beam to pull in enemy ships, hit victim with tractor beam, pull towards you then board with ship capture or is tractor beam part of ship capture routine? I haven't used ship capture yet so don't know. still experimenting with various things yet,,
Did you make the small worlds colonies or just bases for repair & supply? How did you get tech research, from your bases, planets, or thru liberating them from friend & foe or from all? mac

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Regarding the tractor beams - I've never used em - never could find a need for them either - as long as your ships can manuever you're ok w/o em, plus they wld take up valuable space on ships (not to mention the costs)

Ship capture is simple - 2 things to remember - 1) make sure target ship has shields down (can't capture a ship w/sheilds still up) 2) make sure you're adjacent to the target ship and that your boarding ship has a undamaged boarding party

I made the 2 tiny moons Intell centers (6 Pirate intell center per)

got tech via research (to get to the initial ship capture - takes a looooong time) but mostly via ship capture/analyze



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Character is best defined as that which you do when you believe nobody is watching.

[WhiteHojo]

quote:

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Originally posted by suicide_junkie:

That's why pirates shouldn't get colony tech. Instead, you'd have to capture a rock colony ship from somebody else before you could move in.

The pirates shouldn't be relying on planetary production, but thievery instead.

Question: Did you have min settings on environmental resistance?

If you have both min env. res. and min reproduction, you require a perfect planet to get any growth at all Makes capturing slaves more important too. Finding a large transport with 500M people means you get to boost production on some planet by 20% or so.

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to me capturing colony ships from other races and allowing the pirate race to use those for expansion allows the pirate race to expand MUCH faster than making em only use colony ships that they build themselves.

My game experience lends me to my new view on pirate colonization... A pirate should only colonize 1 planet at a time (this might be more a hybrid of SJ's view and my original limited expansion view)...

Once I found the 3 planets in one square - 1 large w/no atmo and 2 tiny moons w/no atmo I essentially abbandoned my original homeworld, and relocated to the new base of operations - kinda like finding a better island w/safer harbors that's more off the beaten path but also allows access to rich shipping lanes... After colonizing your preferred base, the pirate wouldn't need to find another unless that one was overrun and destroyed - If that happens, simply capture another races colony ship and either 1) use their race to populate your new home or 2) if you happen to have a small sampling of your pop handy (maybe stash some on a transport in some out of the way secret pirate base) and use them after jettisoning, er I mean makin the old pop on the colony ship walk the plank...

As for environ resist, I think I did min that one, but to this day, I'm not sure exactly what effect it has on the game...

I also thought that physic was the special tech to get at the start but now I'm not so sure - something about capturing a ship w/o any bloodshed offends my good pirate sensibilities.

If it wasn't for the pop increase special components that org tech gives, i'd think that Org would be the best for Pirates do to the incred armor that you get - armor, to me, is much preferable on a boarding ship than shields. As for mixing armor and shields, to me I like to keep my ships small and cheap (LC or smaller) so no room for both.

I also continue to voice my objection to using any captured pop as slaves or whatever... a pirate might deal in slaves but I don't see em using em to colonize planets. just allows too much expansion.

As for not using a planet to get resources I agree - to a point. I found that w/o using the planet at the beginning of the game b/f I got ship capture, I would have run out of resources and died of stagnation - it's unavoidable that a race will have to use planetside resource generating mines to get a foothold in the early game - after that, I agree that resources should come from the spoils of the sea...




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Character is best defined as that which you do when you believe nobody is watching.

[Nitram Draw]

There isn't any formal mod for a pirate race yet. It's more of a role playing race right now. I know suicide junkie has played it for a while and some others have also explored it. I've fooled around with it a bit also. I hope one day that it could actually be made into a mod. It is a great idea and fun to play.

[Suicide Junkie]

quote:

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to me capturing colony ships from other races and allowing the pirate race to use those for expansion allows the pirate race to expand MUCH faster than making em only use colony ships that they build themselves...... A pirate should only colonize 1 planet at a time ...

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Q: how do you plan on enforcing this?
Anything you capture in SE4 can be used as if you built it yourself.

Also, if you have to use captured ships to colonize, you won't get any until some time into the game, and since you can't retrofit the colonies (you don't have access to the tech), you have to make do with an ice colony instead of that prime triple rock world.
Captured colony ships don't make expansion very fast at all.

quote:

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If [you find a better planet] happens, simply capture another races colony ship and either 1) use their race to populate your new home or 2) if you happen to have a small sampling of your pop handy (maybe stash some on a transport in some out of the way secret pirate base) and use them after jettisoning, er I mean makin the old pop on the colony ship walk the plank...

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Are you supporting the use of captured colony ships here?

quote:

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As for environ resist, I think I did min that one, but to this day, I'm not sure exactly what effect it has on the game...

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What I believe it does is make your growth rate drop faster as conditions deteriorate.
Ie. if you have god-like environment resist, a harsh world will have 1% less reproduction than a optimal world. For the pirates, anything other than optimal causes a severe decrease in growth.

quote:

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I also thought that [psychic] was the special tech to get at the start but now I'm not so sure - something about capturing a ship w/o any bloodshed offends my good pirate sensibilities.

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Yeah, I've found that it makes it too easy to capture most of the enemy fleet in one turn and destroy the rest with thier own ships. Boarding parties should be used instead.

quote:

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I also continue to voice my objection to using any captured pop as slaves or whatever... a pirate might deal in slaves but I don't see em using em to colonize planets. just allows too much expansion.

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Note that the captured race gets all of your racial traits except for what they breathe. This means that any captured pop will have zero growth too. The addition of 20M people at a time is not going to expand your empire much.
If I would have allowed the construction of colony ships, I would have had three systems colonized instead of three planets.

quote:

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As for not using a planet to get resources I agree - to a point. I found that w/o using the planet at the beginning of the game b/f I got ship capture, I would have run out of resources and died of stagnation - it's unavoidable that a race will have to use planetside resource generating mines to get a foothold in the early game - after that, I agree that resources should come from the spoils of the sea...

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Naturally. The homeworld is/should only be good for getting the boarding party tech and for funding the first secret bases.
Not long into the game, you should be overwhelmed by intel, and be forced to abandon your planets, thus forcing you to become nomadic and getting your resources from ship capture. The zero maintenance thing I was doing was intended for the time when you lose all your planets.

Note that you always have 50k storage and 200 production of each resource. With zero maintenance, a Pirate race could theoretically come back from having only one space yard station.

[mac5732]

SJ & WHojo, what about limiting the amount of resources or tech from planet that you are on. Possibly limiting this to say after turn 50 or 100. that way you would have it in the beginning but after that you would have better luck on your bases, ships.
In regards to colony ships, is it possible to mod so that captured pop could be used as a form of trade. This way when you capture a
colony ship, you could trade to any player, if no takers, then they take the long walk on the plank, and you keep the ship. if this
is possible you could take away the colonization aspect of using captured pop to colonize thus cutting down on rapid expansion
As for tractor beams, it just seems that this is something in the game that is basically useless. I just thought by utilizing it as a vital piece it would liven up the boarding and make it worthwhile to have. I guess I read to much of the old Lesman series by EE Doc Smith. The pirates always used tractor beams to pull victims in.
just some ideas. mac

another quick thought, how about letting them able to capture and use robo-miners to get resources instead of using planets?

[This message has been edited by mac5732 (edited 13 March 2001).]

[DirectorTsaarx]

quote:

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Originally posted by suicide_junkie:
<snipped a lot of stuff>
Note that you always have 50k storage and 200 production of each resource. With zero maintenance, a Pirate race could theoretically come back from having only one space yard station.

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And you could always have your pirates do some remote mining; in fact, maybe the "secret base" could be a base station or starbase in an asteroid field with some mining components and a repair bay; when the asteroids are mined out (or you've maxed out storage and you don't need to mine for a while), retrofit the base to include something else besides the miners. Or use satellites (if you've researched 'em, or captured an enemy's satellite layer).

Just some thoughts. I realize pirates aren't necessarily good miners, but you could just think of them as scavengers instead, and they're just taking whatever they can find in the asteroids in addition to preying on ships.

BTW - I have a reason for the 200 production per turn (besides the obvious fact that it's one of the default settings): it represents the pirates preying on the "invisible freighters" used by all empires to move their resources around. Of course, I think the pirates should get a bonus on this one...

[WhiteHojo]

Ah, the joy of the active thread - come to work, check the board and find that there are others who have the same priorities in life as me - scary...

quote:

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Originally posted by suicide_junkie:
Q: how do you plan on enforcing this?

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I assume you'd enforce it the same way you would enforce the no planet sided mining after the beginning or any other preferrence, via the roleplay.

quote:

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Also, if you have to use captured ships to colonize, you won't get any until some time into the game, and since you can't retrofit the colonies (you don't have access to the tech), you have to make do with an ice colony instead of that prime triple rock world.
Captured colony ships don't make expansion very fast at all.

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I'm only basing this on my 1 game as a pirate but by the time I got ship capture, I was running into as many colony ships as war ships - my first capture and analys was a colony ship - If I was allowed to use captured colony pops and colony ships all the time for expansion, I'd have been expanding at a rate far exceeding that available to me using only slower, lower cargo capacity pirate colonizers. (should be noted that the game setup will also affect this - I was using only colonize homeworld type, rock).

Not sure i understand the "can't retrofit" part of the post but it's early...

quote:

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If [you find a better planet] happens, simply capture another races colony ship and either 1) use their race to populate your new home or 2) if you happen to have a small sampling of your pop handy (maybe stash some on a transport in some out of the way secret pirate base) and use them after jettisoning, er I mean makin the old pop on the colony ship walk the plank


Are you supporting the use of captured colony ships here?...

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Dire situations call for dire actions - when faced with the extinction of the pirate race, sure.

quote:

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Note that the captured race gets all of your racial traits except for what they breathe. This means that any captured pop will have zero growth too. The addition of 20M people at a time is not going to expand your empire much.
If I would have allowed the construction of colony ships, I would have had three systems colonized instead of three planets.

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I recognize this, but to me being able to dump 20M (if capture a colony ship) or upwards of 200M (If capture a transport w/pop - seen this one 3 times in my 1 game) flies in the face of what I thought we both agreed was an important limiting factor of the Pirate - slow, very slow expansion...


SJ, do you think maybe we're focusing too much on the roleplayin aspect of the pirate race and instead maybe we should be working on the programing of the AI to play a Pirate? Personally, Untill the AI can show me it can handle Ship Capture on a consistant basis, I don't think it's possible to have a AI run Pirate Race that is competitve - I believe they'd be the equivelant of a Neurtal...




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Character is best defined as that which you do when you believe nobody is watching.