> But the economy of scale should fit. It's the moth's size, capacity, and performance
> that make it the vehicle of choice... If I have to make three trips in a smaller ship,
> or one trip in a large ship... guess what I'm choosin'? Especially if I am
> guaranteed successful passage.

Well, currently you're very nearly guaranteed a successful passage. Which IMO is a problem, because it means there's no challenge to trading, and no reward to pirating. I'd like it better if the Moth was like a high risk/high reward investment - it's risky because it's vulnerable to pirates, but if it does get through, it has a high reward.

> I'm saying that the perf part of the equation can be nerfed a bit... and that simply
> makes a *more* equal playing field... and the smaller ships don't lose anything...

Well, I do agree with making moderate changes & continuing to adjust, rather than radical changes, but IMO it's going to take more than a small change to really affect the Moth.

> and the effort to succeed in the moth is worth the little extra effort.

Is it, though? Remember, even if a single pirate destroyed the Moth, it's very unlikely he did it in another Moth. Which means the pirate either only gets a fraction of the cargo, or else has to split the reward with another pirate who grabs the cargo in another Moth. Either way, the best a pirate can reasonably hope for is 1/2 the reward from the kill. Which means the Moth is not much more worthwhile to a pirate than the smaller ships, except for it being easier to kill.

> although I am also of the opinion that there *should* be uber ships/equipment...
> but there should be a *cost* at obtaining them

Hmm... tricky ground here. Depending on what the "cost" to obtain the uber stuff is, I may or may not agree with you. Currently, the costs for the equipment in the game are credits, licenses, faction standing, and badges. And currently, none of these costs are really "expensive" enough to justify making anything particularly uber. But that may change.

Back in our moth poping heyday (when it first came out) it would usualy take 3 of us to get a moth. And that was mostly cus no one yet knew how to fly them. We would then either split it (the money) three ways or just stick it all in the BLAK bank.

Which means the Moth is not much more worthwhile to a pirate than the smaller ships, except for it being easier to kill.

My point *exactly*. It shouldn't be. But it should be vulnerable.

Good point, Borbmeister... :)~

[edit] BTW... you're under arrest!

Why not? If it's more worthwhile than the other trade ships to an individual trader, then why shouldn't it be more worthwhile than the other trade ships for an individual pirate?

However, what makes it worthwhile can be different. For the individual trader, it's worthwhile because it's a high return investment. For the individual pirate, it should be more worthwhile because it's easier to catch & kill than the other trade ships.

I see your point... and I guess we just have to agree to disagree. Making it *more* vulnerable than smaller ships is not realistic... That thing is friggin' huge. To support it's own weight through the force moments *requires* more hull (for a monocoque design enabling the room for the cargo)... otherwise, you'd start requiring certain g-force limitations on other ships...

Hey, now that is not a bad idea... you're on to something here... let's start setting certain limitations on each of the craft that pilots can actually exceed... (*that* is real life)... you exceed the design parameters... you die. Full turbo turns are a thing of the past... (okay, you can't do that now anyway, cause if you are turboing, you aren't turning... but there are pulse turns)... and the dynamics should change versus load... meaning that the heavier you are (total mass here - but possibly also the *distribution* of said load) affects the handling... the more restrictive the CG of the load... the more restrictive the handling...

I LIKE IT! :)~

[edit] okay... don't hornk me because I said mass should effect handling because it already does... I know that... but the CG is always *fixed* currently... and that *could* change...[/edit]

Bleh. Let's not start a "realistic/not realistic" argument. Realism can add to the enjoyment value of a game, but it doesn't always. My real life is 100% realistic, but it bores me to tears sometimes. And actually, I could argue against "Making it *more* vulnerable than smaller ships is not realistic". The one thing I'm going to point out, is that I'm not suggesting decreasing the Moth's hull strength - just its max speed. The Moth has way more hull strength than anything else, and I'm fine with that.

Oh, boy... structural physics. The more realistic you go with those, the more CPU expensive it's going to get. And not many people will notice more than a slight change, unless they do something that tears their ship apart. It's much easier to just assume the ship designs are incapable of any maneuvers that would exceed what their structural strength can handle.

What we need is more people. more players. more pirates.

I would be happy for more traders my self...

i've got it!!!

make a version of the Moth that only has 90 cargo, has a drain of 60 and a top turbo speed of 200, and only has 1 weapon, but that weapon is a Cap ship beam cannon (forward mounted with about a 10 degree auto aim cone and a range of 650m). Also It should only have 3/4 the Hp of a normal moth.

The justafication for all this being that the cargo space is now being used for the engins and the beam cannon, and the reduced armor is to compensate for the added mass of the extera engin and the heavy weapon.

that way, it can move prety fast, and deal out a LOT of hurt, but it can't run for long, and it isn't desined for a dogfight. This ship is desined to chase down trade ships and either force their surrender or put them to the sword. Furthermore it can carry the booty home itself. now obviously because the moth has poor spin torque for it's mass it would still be in trouble if the trade ship were escorted by good pilots, but i think it would give the pirates the edge they need to make a dishonest living.

That makes no sense.

It's near impossible to take down a moth with a valk that goes 240 at 55 drain, so you think a slower top speed, a slower acceleration, and a higher drain will help?

The problem is the moth, not the ships chasing it.

The moth is fast, but I like it fast, perhaps it IS too fast, and slowing it down is an issue that people are working on.

BEAM CANNONS ON MOTHS?!? are you nuts? thats what a minifrig or a 2 person rag is for! :P
A cargo ship should not have a awsome weopon, besides, the moth is ussually running, not chasing.
If your idea where implemented, pirates would take up the moth and use it to kill other moths, the beam cannon would be a curse, not a blessing.

I would like to see I pirate moth varent and I think Q may be on the right track.

the moth i perposed isn't a cargo ship it's a pirate ship.

it would never be used for cargo because it' can't infinaboost, it has less stowage than other moths and it would require combat and weapons levels.

however it adresses the main issues with pirating:
engagment range
damage verses time
ability to carry the cargo back home.

i would of coarse also like to see even larger ships like the mini frig but think about it, if you have moths runnign arouind evenmtualy som one will try to m ake one a viable pirate ship.

of coarse the exact stats of the pirate moth will probably have to be adjusted signifigantly from my original sugestion.

also the fact that some people said it was crazy and others said it was on the right track seems to indicate to me that it likely is the sort of ship we need for making piracy a viable playing option.

"This is either madness or Briliance"

"It's amaizing how often those 2 trates coencide"

-Pirates of the Carribean

Cam,

i'm sugesting a ship taht only needs to get 4 shots off with a weapon that is most effective at a rabge between 600 and 650m. Aditionaly the pirate will be camping a nav point, and will therefore be able to take advantage of battery charge times. Also the intent is to catch (or rather persue) a moth which has a lower turbo speed than the perposed ship.

"I don't need to catch them, just get them in range of the long nines"

-also from pirates of the carribean

and no, the problem isn't the moth. the problem is that there are no player owned ships that qualify as anything more than a light shuttel, withy the exception of the moth (which i would call a hevy shuttel).

other than that most of my modificatins were aimed at preventing the pirate version of the moth from being able to dogfight effectively, and from becoming a viable cargo ship in it's own right.

VincentV,

i think you missed the point. my idea was this:
there be 2 versions of the moth, one will be the current cargo moth and the other would be a pirate moth, posably a corvus modification. and the pirate moth (the one with the beam cannon) would be intended as an anti moth, moth.

so what you described as the terable downside of my sugestion was in fact the core of my idea. seeing it from that perspective may help you understand the elagence of the solution.

I have two objections against that Pirate Behemoth, both easily overcome.

First, IMO the Marauder should be the ultimate pirate ship, rather than the Behemoth. I mean, just look at their names: Marauder, Behemoth. The Behemoth should be bigger (which it is), while the Marauder should be more fearsome (which compared to your Pirate Moth, it wouldn't be). Also, the Marauder is a Nation Special ship, while the Behemoth in a generic ship available to all nations. Even if the Pirate Moth was a Corvus special, I still think the Marauder should be (slightly) better. IMO the Valk should be the best light fighter, the Prom should be the best heavy fighter, and the Marauder should be the best pirate ship. The other faction specials, IBG, SVG, Rev. C, and the proposed Pirate Moth, which are all variants of generic ships, should be very good, but not quite as good as the Nation Special ships.

Second, I think that Pirate Behemoth might be a little too uber. I've said this before, but I think a good pirate ship should be able to catch & kill a trade ship, and carry its cargo, all of which the suggested Behemoth checks off on. But, a large cargo pirate ship should have the drawback of not being able to stand up against any escorts a trader might have, unless the pirate also has a group. You suggested dropping the Pirate Behemoth's armor to 75% of the current Behemoths, but even with that I think it would have enough armor, and would be fast enough, that it could probably just ignore an escort or two, and boom the trader & make off with the goods.

With just a couple changes though I can see those objections being solved. As with the capships, make the Pirate Moth's turret targetable & destructable, seperate from the rest of the ship, but the Behemoth's turret should be much easier to destroy than a capship's turret. That would make it so any escorts of a trader could effectively defang the Pirate Moth. For the Marauders, if they were given the advantage of cargo mass reduction, like I've suggested in a couple other threads, and had their other stats tweaked a bit, then they could be made to be somewhat superior as pirate ships compared with the Pirate Moth - not too much better, but a little bit.

[edit]
Also, I think a beam cannon range of 650m might be a bit too long. Somewhere between 350m to 500m might be better.
[/edit]

well like i said the exact stat's probably need to be tweeked, but the beam cannon i perposed isn't realy a turret, it's a mounted weapon with a limited auto aim. Also because the pirat moth has a drain of 60 and a top turbo speed of 200 it wouldn't be able to escape from a fighter escort. it could of coarse try and pop the escorts with it's beam cannon, but that may give the trade ship the criticle time to escape (again due to the high drain of the pirat moth's turbo), and could take some effort an skill if the escort pilots knew what they were doing.

as far as making the merauder a better pirat ship, i agree, but i have a hard time thinking of exactly how this should be done. one idea i had was to upgrade the merauder's weapons to 3 L ports. That way it caries a huge amount of ordanace for it's size, but that will likely make it too good in combat.

I think tractor beems would be another posability, if there were an S sised weapon that deactivated the turbo on any target it hit then a maud might be a better pirat ship. As it would still be able to carry 2 actual weapons while it was tractoring. This would similarly help out the Centaur, Mineral Hog, Wraith, and probably prom (i don't know the prom's stats too well) as pirat ships, but off the top of my head i'd say the best would be maud or centaur depending on your tase in weapons 9large or small) followed by the mineral hog (1L left and 20cu to fill, plus the manuverability of a hog till you fill up with ore)

The problem with making a good pirat ship is that a pirat ship needs both exelent handling in combat and exelent cargo capacity. so to balance it there needs to be some other aplication that it is defficent in.

the phylosophy i used with the pirat moth was that eventualy somone is going to try and put a weapon that was desined for a capitle ship onto a fighter, and the only platform we have now that could be done to without creating an unbalanced ship was the moth IMO.

a good pirate wessel doesn't have to be good in combat, or at least not in a dogfight. I still think dropping the Corv Mauds thrust to 55 or 50, and giving it 300-350 turbo thrust and 225 top speed, but lowering its spin torque, would make a great chaser. mines would be a huge problem for it, but that's okay.

you wouldn't want to dogfight in it, CtC is iffy too due to the lack of spin torque, but of course, you could use it for these tasks if you wanted to, it's just that the Atlas X would be a lot better of an all-rounder.

anyway, lowering the moth and refitting the corv maud, there we go. a good pirate ship that is recognizable as a pirate ship (no more Valks everywhere and stuff) and it belongs to corvus. I think that'd be neat.

Your all still trying to make everything a one man show, not every activity in the game or in life can be accomplished by an individual. Some things require more then one person. Pirating is one of them. So, making any one ship good for both taking down and capturing the cargo IMO is a bad idea. Pirating should require at least 2 if not 3 people minimum. One or two to attack and once to collect cargo. I've never heard or read of any pirate from any time period that did it all himself, why should they be able to in VO?

one trader should be doable with one good pirate. apart from the player base issue, if you require 2-3 pirates per trader, you'll never see anyone threaten a transport with todays setup.

groups should fight groups. groups are good, but they should interact with other groups.

anyway, just adding more pirates won't make a real difference with todays behemoth. when I can get away from three pirates in IDF valks with ease, I fail to see why someone who trades for a living and should know that gig better should run into problems.

 johnhawl218,

i bet you also never heard of a pirat who commanded a fleet of one man ships.

pirating should be doable in one ship otherwise it will be too much trouble. there aren't enough players to make it profitable for 3 pirats to work together, now this could change with the introduction of player pwned cap ships, but as long as everyone is in a fighter, a bomber, or a shuttel, pirating will be an indavidual activity.

Funny I never heard of traders of any time that could do it by them self's yet here they are in VO doing just that.