Pirates: Make them leave when the bounty is gone

Makes sense, makes them balanced

from Sins Forums

So here's a thought: why not make the amount of time the pirates stay at their target star system correlate to how much money was paid to them? There might need to be some tweaking of the current amount of bounty taken away for damage done (i.e. let them stick around a reasonable amount of time).

If the pirates are just in it for the money this would mean that once the money runs out so do they. If pirates are just too buff why not limit the amount of time they'll spend taking out a player's planet?/fleet If someone wants more damage done they pour more money into the pirates. And, once the pirates are done collecting their money and there's nothing left in it for them they head back home to count up the loot.

If someone wants to apply more of a beating they can pour more money into the pirates. Or, perhaps the pirate fleet travels around to different players' targets, going after those with less bounty on them after the first person has been dealt with.

I personally liked the pirates as they were before being "nerfed" by the recent patch. But this solution would be the best of both worlds: allowing for powerful pirates while at the same time limiting the damage they do.

4,291 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top

sry but i doubt this would work well,

since you can increase bounty whenever you feel like it you can let the pirates stay somewhere until you are happy, be it costly,

the further in the game you get, the more powerfull pirates get, but if you have little bounty then suddenly you don't need to worry much because they'll leave anyway, (just send a couple a scouts and done)

correct me if im wrong, but i always felt that you should always worry for pirates, if they come for you you should be ready for them and if you are not, then why the hell didn't you? (im not talking about the actual situation of it as it is now, but as i think it should be)

planet defenses arent great, unless you max it out and the pirates are still fairly weak pirates should be able to take those defenses out if there isn't a fleet around to aid the defenses, (well, save for a nicely upgraded vasari starbase perhaps)

if you let bounty control the pirates after they have set out you basicly allow the players to decide what the pirates do, which shouldn't be the case,

Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting TheNosferatu, reply 1

if you let bounty control the pirates after they have set out you basicly allow the players to decide what the pirates do, which shouldn't be the case,
End of TheNosferatu's quote

Isn't that the way it is now? Highest bountied target gets attacked, and each player (either AI or human) posts the bounty? I agree, though, that after they set out players shouldn't be able to control them any more.

I think you have a good point about continuing to up the bounty and having the pirates stick around forever. But in that case the player's fleet would be able to keep pounding on them. Maybe once the planet is nuked and all structures destroyed the pirates would then leave, or something like that. I'm sure there would be some way to balance that out and keep the pirates from sticking around forever.

Elemental: Reforged
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top

I'm sure there is some way to make it work, but it would probably require for the whole system that makes the pirates react the way they do to be re-written,

I think its better to make the pirates a specific strength and make them upgrade roughly the same speed as you, so they are always a treat yet never overpowered or simply expierence-cows,

this is the way it (should) work now, and personaly i think they done it quite nicely (prior to the 1.01 patch) of course, the draw-back here is that not everybody seems to have the same idea of what the pirates should be like and thus the pirates get nerfed / buffed a couple a times before they get it right,

maybe not the most possible ideal situation but i do think it comes quite close

Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top

This doesn't seem too difficult, the pirates could just behave as they do now with the added rule that they call off an attack if the bounty drops off; current limits still apply.

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top

maybe the devs can work it out to show the exact time left before the raid commences?

Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top

This isn't a bad idea.  The mission system is realistic in that more $ = more pirates.  With the normal raids, one person bidding 250 credits can spawn 20+ pirate ships to attack.  And they will stay until everything is dead.  It seems far more realistic that they would leave if there's no more money to be gained.  I don't care if throwing more money on bounty extends the raid length, so long as the damage pirates cause is proportional to the money spend on them.