Piracy Campaign

[David Johnston2]

[QUOTE=Neophyte42;794831]

As much as Ragitsu was joking, why not add an occasional cyberpunk-style data-raiding mission to the game?

As for space piracy, I think that really depends on why space travel is happening. Pirates always like to operate within a short (relative) distance to their logistical base.

One distinction between the Golden Age of Piracy and the mundane pirates that have always plagued cargo shipping, is that the Golden Age was an exception to that rule. For a century or so, pirate ships roamed free all over the Atlantic and around the Horn to Madagascar.

If your space travel is in system only, then perhaps an asteroid belt is where the pirates hide, so attacks are most likely when traveling near said belt.

If your space travel is in-system, piracy is impossible without a superscience invisibility cloak.

If your FTL is fixed point jump based, then the pirates will likely set up shop near jump points (whether natural or man-made gates) that are also near some sort of planet / planetoid capable of maintaining a fixed base of operations.

"Fixed" jump points, permanent choke points are a little too easy for the authorities to control. Pirates don't hang out at navigation canals or straits. Never did. They'd hang out on coastlines and islands that were controlled by friendly rulers or disorganised ones that couldn't control that commercial ships would have to pass by on the way from choke point to choke point.

If FTL is more free form, then pirate might try to set up near planets importing or exporting high value goods. Many of these planets will be well patrolled. If the FTL beginning or end has to be (again, relatively) far from planetary gravity, this opens up the patrol area, meaning less coverage. However, this also means lower probability of a ship being near where the pirates are.

Ideally your drive system should allow in-flight detection and interception of other ships. That gives you all of interstellar space that the anti-pirates will need to keep track of. Provided that the commercial traffic is really dense, you'll spot prey, but your hunters will have great difficulty spotting you.