Space Piracy

[Kitsune]

How would space piracy look like in the THS setting? Assuming they exist (if not, why don't they?), how do space pirates operate, how do they find and overcome their victims? What are they after? From what bases do they operate? And how about a space pirates campaign? Ideas anyone?

[vicky_molokh]

They mostly try to steal black holes, apparently . . .

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Kitsune

How would space piracy look like in the THS setting? Assuming they exist (if not, why don't they?), how do space pirates operate, how do they find and overcome their victims? What are they after? From what bases do they operate? And how about a space pirates campaign? Ideas anyone?

This is covered a little in ......Deep Beyond I think.
A group of Red Duncanite Gypsy Angels hijacked a robotic He3 transport traveling from Saturn to Earth orbit and headed back out towards the outer system with it.

The only thing preventing their eventual eradication was the time and money it would take to chase them down. Probably more than the shipment was worth.

Enough security was added to the transports to prevent ut from happening again and the shipment was written off basically. The Gypsy Angels will probably get theirs' in the future as legitimate commerce and colonization expands to the outer system.

The main problem for pirates in general is that you can't seize a ship and vanish into the trackless ocean by sailing over the horizon. The solar system is very well tracked indeed and there I no real stealth for the ships in it.

[David Johnston2]

Yes, one of the many disadvantages to a solar system setting is that in general space piracy is simply impossible, particularly with reaction drives. Your ability to hide is so limited, and your maneuvering options so constrained that the idea simply doesn't work.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

The only thing preventing their eventual eradication was the time and money it would take to chase them down. Probably more than the shipment was worth.

A couple nuclear armed AKVs tossed in the direction of their stations wouldn't be very expensive and probably stand a decent chance of killing them all. I assume nobody is quite yet ready to take the heat for killing the innocent along with the guilty.

The main problem for pirates in general is that you can't seize a ship and vanish into the trackless ocean by sailing over the horizon. The solar system is very well tracked indeed and there I no real stealth for the ships in it.

And too how much good is it to steal something if you can't fence it? Here on Earth there are still plenty of small ports you can put into and offload a ship without anybody asking awkward questions, and it's relatively easy for cargo shipments to be anonymized. But in 2100 unregulated *spaceports* are in short supply, and most of the really valuable stuff is loaded with electronics that are reporting its status and location to somebody pretty much all the time.

[Lord Azagthoth]

The opening scene of Ice Pirates lets you see space pirates at work (although not to successfully).

Depending on what wepaons are available, they want to either capture ships or its cargo (or crew), and want to disable ships instead of damaging them.

Means to board ships must be possible either by physically docking or using transporters, jumping out of their own ship and using high tech magnetic grappling hooks.

Their targets are most likely freighters, small transports or other easy targets. If they are escorted they will try to separate the escort or destroy it. Depending on how FTL drives work, they have a limited (or unlimited) time to do their job.

Their hideout can be a mobile base or somewhere where scanners/sensors don't work well or not at all (for incoming ships) due to some spacial disturbance (and the pirates know how to calibrate their sensor to see incoming ships on time).

I think a Space Pirates campaign can be fun. Always on the run, stealing from the filthy rich who don't deserve to be rich, caquiring dangerous cargo which they can't get rid off but imposes many difficulties, etc...

[Flyndaran]

All your suggestions work for Space Opera settings, but not THS.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Lord Azagthoth

Depending on what wepaons are available, they want to either capture ships or its cargo (or crew), and want to disable ships instead of damaging them.

There's a lack of such weapons in the THS setting. Ships are fragile, and weapons are powerful; ships do not usually engage directly and use missiles.

Means to board ships must be possible either by physically docking or using transporters, jumping out of their own ship and using high tech magnetic grappling hooks.

THS is a somewhat realistic high-tech setting; its outbreaks of ultra-tech are in AI, biology, and terraforming. Transporters simply don't exist, and would look very out-of-place if you added them.

Intercepting ships in transit is actually hard. The fusion-powered reaction drives used in the setting have quite low acceleration. so matching velocities requires knowing the target's flight plan and being in the right place at the right time, then a long period of acceleration to match up. Because fusion drive exhausts are very obvious, your target will be easily able to detect you, and so will everyone else in the solar system. There Is No Stealth In Space.

Once you have matched velocities with your target, docked, taken the cargo, and their fuel, you need to get away. That means you need to change course, using your fusion drive, and still being totally obvious, and unless you're very lucky, you'll have to burn fuel to lose all the velocity you put on to rendezvous with your target, because you're going in the wrong direction for your base. Then you head back to your base. Even when you aren't running your fusion drive, your ship is obvious on infra-red from anywhere in the solar system, and so will your base be once your course gives the setting's navies a hint of where to look for it with telescopes.

And the fuel problem ... yeah. Fuel comes from large-scale mining processes, on the Moon, or from the atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn. If your pirate base is somewhere in the outer solar system, where things are quieter, you have very long transit times to get there, or back again. There aren't many people out there to sell your loot to either.

Their targets are most likely freighters, small transports or other easy targets. If they are escorted they will try to separate the escort or destroy it. Depending on how FTL drives work, they have a limited (or unlimited) time to do their job.

There are no FTL drives in THS. Adding them as a common enough piece of equipment that pirates would have one will mean that humanity is spread over lots of star systems. It isn't really THS any more at that point.

Their hideout can be a mobile base

Still obvious on infra-red.

or somewhere where scanners/sensors don't work well or not at all (for incoming ships) due to some spacial disturbance (and the pirates know how to calibrate their sensor to see incoming ships on time).

Such things don't exist in the THS solar system.

Have you read the THS core book? It's rather different from the kind of space-opera setting you seem to be thinking in terms of.

[Lord Azagthoth]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Have you read the THS core book? It's rather different from the kind of space-opera setting you seem to be thinking in terms of.

Well, you have answered all the questions why space piracy doesn't exist in THS and you're right, I have only briefly skimmed the book. It's a hard SF setting and not space opera.

[Phil Masters]

Actually, there are, canonically, some space pirates in the setting. They're just very rare, very desperate, and quite likely doomed - and frankly the number of them probably still stretches suspension of disbelief. See Deep Beyond, pp.104-5.