The Pirate Discussion: An Open Letter to the Developers and Naval Action Community

[Anymn]

I think the current state of the game has it flaws with regards to piracy, but I strictly reason against any form of in-game jail/not being able to login, etc. 

In my opinion, there have to be a healthy balance between pirates, traders and those who hunt pirates.

 

Traders

Player traders should never feel completely safe against pirates when traveling their goods when not in a fleet. In return for that, this will increase the prices/profits of traders as the demands will grow with every captured good. What I didn't hear in this discussion, is that merchant ships can outrun a pirate ship currently with pure speed. A heavy load should slow them significantly down. A lone, heavy loaded trader against a pirate, should be doomed. That's historical.

 

Hunters

With the help of missions, players should get an extra reward when hunting down a pirate. Many captains received a hunting order to get a pirate down (bounty). This role can be much more prominent in the current game, as now it is only restricted to hunting PVE pirates. When this is implemented properly, it will be more worthwhile to play as a brave hunter than playing a risky pirate life.

 

Pirates

Many people say that pirates should not have their own cities. But IRL there were multiple *pirate nests*, places that were made by pirates themselves (Port Royal, Tortuga, St. Mary's Island, Barataria Bay, New providence).  But those nests did not have a nicely organized forts, but relied there safety upon no-one knowing where it is. Historically, a pirate would not capture a city because they could be wrecked out that city by any navy at any time. Instead, he would plunder the city, keep the riches and hurt the economy, and take those riches to there pirate nests. From the pirate nests, the goods could be smuggled towards a nation's port, depending on market values. So should pirates own cities? They should be able, but should hardly be able to defend it. Like limiting the defend fleet of the city to max 5-10 ships. They should have access to some pirate nests however, and those will only show up on a pirates map. 

 

Pirates never should get hunted down and jailed for RL time, or lose all their possessions. This is a game, and when people choose a pirates life, they should get fun in reward. If the population of pirates is growing to hard, other actions can be taken than simply *banning a player*. For example: more PVE fleets on a trade route when piracy is high, for hunting pirates down. Or: Players can enter a PVP pirating instance in a wider time frame.

 

Also, people raise the suggestion to limit pirates in there ship choice. I would not copy that either. All players should be able to use all ships in the game, don't limit them. However, it can be made harder by lowering the durability of pirate controlled ships to 1. That way, pirating is risky. It could be further enhanced by giving pirates the ability to sell ships with 1 durability. Nation-bounded players can choose themselves whether they want to spare some money and support the capturing of ships, or resists against shady trading and buy one of a crafter instead.

 

When a player has enough of his pirate life, there should be a way to get back to normal life. Something like a reputation system.