[SCRIPT] PIRACY! Package : Preview : 13-04-12

[jack775544]

Maybe you should use marines\mercenaries as your enforcers amoung the slaves. They would be much more eager to pull out a shield from that frigate wreck if they had a marine statnding next to them .
You could also use marines instead of rifles when enslaving people for bribes (eg. for every marine on board you can increase the bribe amount. And if you want to still enslave the people after they paid the bribes you would need more marines still.)

And I don't think Sector Traffic Analysis is overpowered, I have always wanted a feature like that so it may affect my judgment . But maybe you could say Freight Scanner, Bioscanner, Duplex Scanner, and Triplex Scanner should all be installed to unlock the option. You could make a new ware but to do that you would need EMP and personally I think that it looks a bit messy and unprofesional. Or you could use one of the lesser used spare software slots like SS_WARE_SW_NEW17 which has the "Cartel-inc. Shield Hacker" bound to it which I don't think anyone uses (well not many at least). This method will bring conflicts to anyone who uses that ware though.

List of spare software slots

Keep up the good work on all your projects (as they all look amazing)

Thanks
Jack

[mr.bear]

You're the second person to ask for marines, that's interesting.

there's quite a few bells and whistles you cant see from the screenshots, cos basically i couldn't be bothered, but you you can already enslave people, extort people, then i think you can space people, and even murder them. you steal their jewelry, chop up their bodies, and they're stored in your cargo bay as something like chelt meat. i can be quite imaginative you see. all of these things depend on whether you have sufficient quantities of sidearms, or disruptor rifles - none of it is hidden, the menu text explains what you need to activate each feature.

Nobody's inspired me with a killer marines idea yet, so i might go away and think about it and introduce them into something totally new.

i wrote these things at the end of 2010, started a "two week" (14 months) project to replace exscriptor, then i planned to finish and release them. the package still doesnt feel complete - i know there's at least two more killer ideas in me, i just haven't had them yet...

[apricotslice]

and even murder them. you steal their jewelry, chop up their bodies, and they're stored in your cargo bay as something like chelt meat.

Hmmm, that sounds like a faction of Canabals are out there. You sell them live or dead people as a food supply.

You could even do a plot around that. You stumble into a sector (by deliberate mis-direction thinking its a mission for something else like build a station in this sector) and you find yourself seriously outgunned by the locals, who turn out to be canabals. They then demand that you bring them x number of people as payment to keep you alive. If you do, you go your own way. If you dont they send a significant task force out to capture you (in proportion to your ship/fleet so that you are vastly outnumbered).

So that could give you a reason for enslaving 500 people.

(Its not often I have a blood thirsty moment like this btw. Must be something wrong with me this morning.)

[The Cuban Nightmare]

(Its not often I have a blood thirsty moment like this btw. Must be something wrong with me this morning.)

There's your problem. I'm blood thirsty in the morning too. I like it though, there's not enough evil in the galaxy as it stands. I mean, come on, everyone and their mother can buy a fighter and you expect me to believe there isn't a bit more smuggling and crime going on? I can't wait to play this, keep it up.[/b]

[101010]

and even murder them. you steal their jewelry, chop up their bodies, and they're stored in your cargo bay as something like chelt meat.

Hmmm, that sounds like a faction of Canabals are out there. You sell them live or dead people as a food supply.

You could even do a plot around that. You stumble into a sector (by deliberate mis-direction thinking its a mission for something else like build a station in this sector) and you find yourself seriously outgunned by the locals, who turn out to be canabals. They then demand that you bring them x number of people as payment to keep you alive. If you do, you go your own way. If you dont they send a significant task force out to capture you (in proportion to your ship/fleet so that you are vastly outnumbered).

So that could give you a reason for enslaving 500 people.

(Its not often I have a blood thirsty moment like this btw. Must be something wrong with me this morning.)

Almost sounds like Reavers or has a Reavers esque quality to it in a way. That could be interesting.

[apricotslice]

Almost sounds like Reavers or has a Reavers esque quality to it in a way. That could be interesting.

Now thats a thought. Actually define Reavers as a faction and give them a chunk of sectors. Define them as total enemies to everyone, and have them agressively attack out of their territory.

Of course to make the previous idea work with reavers, after you deliver the 500 people they want, they eat you anyway. Unless you can jump in a full fleet before they take you out.

[101010]

Almost sounds like Reavers or has a Reavers esque quality to it in a way. That could be interesting.

Now thats a thought. Actually define Reavers as a faction and give them a chunk of sectors. Define them as total enemies to everyone, and have them agressively attack out of their territory.

Of course to make the previous idea work with reavers, after you deliver the 500 people they want, they eat you anyway. Unless you can jump in a full fleet before they take you out.

The concept has a lot of potential. If executed properly it could add a whole new dynamic. I like the Idea of having an unpredictable faction to contend with. Sectors in space that are terrifying to think of let alone go to. And a faction that you have to out smart, and out gun if you want to survive. A real nemesis type enemy that is not going to be deterred easily, that if you don't deal with is going to become more than a mere nuisance.

And I like your take on them turning on you even if you do what they want. None of this getting away unscathed just because you complied with their demands. How would that work any way? You got a bunch of psychopathic cannibals that are going to be all warm and fuzzy because you brought them a bunch of snacky treats? Oh thanks for the food, eat ya later mate. I don't think so, they see you as food, their not going to be nice about it. Regardless their genetic structure their animals not human beings and should act as such.

[jack775544]

all of these things depend on whether you have sufficient quantities of sidearms, or disruptor rifles

I know you can do all these things what I am asking for is a slight change of requiremnts. I mean great, you have 2 dozen disrupter rifles in your cargo bay, but you will also need some bloodthirsty maniacs to hold them . Sorry if I come off a bit blunt at times but whatever direction you take this in I am sure your work will be great.

Thanks
Jack

[vtecem]

The only thing I don't like about this post is the fact I can't download this and play it yet!!!

I like the idea of using marines to hold your rifles and sidearms, but I also think you should be able to convert said slaves into marines through brainwashing. Brainwashing should take a while per brainwashie and should probably have about a 10-20% chance or working. Failure should cause brain damage or psychologically cause the subject to commit suicide (maybe even suicide by cop kind of thing). It would also be nice to be able to eventually cause some of these people that you have "converted" to later go crazy from said brainwashing and kill people until stopped or suicide is committed.

I don't know how far you can go with this, but I can see you being able to hire or recruit crew like this and some will make it and some will only make it temporarily. While others will just go crazy from all the murder and general pirate craziness. Thinking a little "A Clockwork Orange" here with way brainwashing goes (just the opposite of making them good vs evil).

I just wanted to say that I read through your post drooling and wanting to play this method.... Only to find out that you're most likely weeks away from us having a download! I love piracy in this game, but agree that it lacks much love in the way I envision it should be. I just wish I had the script/coding capabilities as some of you here on this forum in order to change it myself.

[mr.bear]

@Jack, @vtecem: I like your logic, I remember thinking the weapons thing didn't make much sense when I wrote it. Some of your mechanics are too complex for me to explain to the player though - I like simplicity! I've taken a few of each of your ideas and added some of my own, what do you think of these mechanics:

• The player can only enslave a maximum of 2 people at a time if they are on their own. Civilian ships usually only contain the pilot, so it'll be easy for the player to find lots of targets.
  
  Once they have at least one slave onboard they can use some kind of new interface to browse their available slaves and select those to convert into henchmen. I guess race would come into play here, with Borons making the worst henchman and perhaps split or pirates making the best. Once converted into henchman they would no longer be available to sell or use as slaves.

(I think there should be the stepping stone of 'henchman' between slaves and marines to stop the player using the feature to create free marines)

• After a henchman has enslaved three or four people, it should become a basic marine. Further experience is gained through enslaving passengers. I think choosing the more violent enslaving options should increase their experience the fastest, but they should stop gaining experience at say, 2 stars, unless you start equipping them pirate sidearms. 4 stars could require disruptor rifles and 5 stars could require murdering passengers with disruptor rifles.

I don't want to change the focus of the scripts into 'army building', so this process of training marines will be much slower than whatever the usual method of training them is. (Remember I've played the game very little!) I want these marines to act as an added bonus, rather than the main focus; as a pirate player you're going to be enslaving quite a lot of people and reaping the rewards, but over time the player will want to capture larger ships. I like the way it mirrors advancement in a typical game achieved through fighting or trading.

This idea would benefit 'Ship Repair Slave Gangs' too. I don't like the idea large numbers of slaves being left on their own, it's unrealistic. I think repairing anything larger than an M3 should require a minimum number of slaves and a certain amount of marines to guard them. Obviously repairing the largest capital ships would require more slaves and more experienced marines.

any thoughts?

[mr.bear]

You could even do a plot around that. You stumble into a sector (by deliberate mis-direction thinking its a mission for something else like build a station in this sector) and you find yourself seriously outgunned by the locals, who turn out to be canabals. They then demand that you bring them x number of people as payment to keep you alive. If you do, you go your own way. If you dont they send a significant task force out to capture you (in proportion to your ship/fleet so that you are vastly outnumbered).

So that could give you a reason for enslaving 500 people.

hey apricot, I really like this idea..

Now thats a thought. Actually define Reavers as a faction and give them a chunk of sectors. Define them as total enemies to everyone, and have them agressively attack out of their territory

I like this idea, but in reality it's just another 'faceless' faction. If I introduced cannibals then no matter how much backstory I give it, I'm really just spawning ships to attack the player.

EDIT: I've also just become concerned about posting plot ideas in public! You know what we've talked about privately, I don't think I want to give away plot ideas like this in public!

[mr.bear]

And I don't think Sector Traffic Analysis is overpowered, I have always wanted a feature like that so it may affect my judgment . But maybe you could say Freight Scanner, Bioscanner, Duplex Scanner, and Triplex Scanner should all be installed to unlock the option

Jack I think this is an awesome idea, I'm definitely going to use this. thanks!

I just wanted to say that I read through your post drooling and wanting to play this method.... Only to find out that you're most likely weeks away from us having a download!

aww, thanks!

[GameDrifter]

I don't think Pirate Guild mod is actively worked on anymore.. I always find myself wanting to play a pirate. Be cool if you could work this mod up to some complete "Play as a Pirate all inclusive" type mod sometime in the future. Something that makes me totally feel like I'am a scum of the galaxy pirate in-game..

My ideal pirate mod would probably include some these features..
1) Sensibility handle's rogue spawned pirates and there abilities to totally trash your pirate rep.
2) Your Slaving ideals/graphics..
3) Ship Hijacking. Station Hijacking/Repackaging/relocating.. Why bother befriending a race just to purchase a silly factory or station? Hijack one pack it up and move it out.. Why buy what you can steal?
4) Mufti pirate factions to join forces with each with there own type of ships/hardware and favorite illegal goods they sell and/or buy.
5) Pirate clan wars for control of the different pirate sectors.. With winners pushing loser clans totally out of galaxy.
6) Player controlled pirate raiding fleets to smash and grab the race sectors for ships/good/maybe station stealing. Based on player rep ranked in the clan/faction.
7) Some sort of tier based perks system for a pirated player to give the player some flavor and immersion in the pirate faction/clan..

I know easy to make a wishlist, hard to make a reality..

[Mad_CatMk2]

it's your script package but I want it now! (anyone? anyone??)

amazing work mr. bear, I can't wait for the release of this...

[mr.bear]

I've just managed to goto a 4-day week for two months so I can finish everything on time! #committed-as-a-bear

[The Cuban Nightmare]

Nice, I will be blasting samurai with field artillery pieces in Shogun 2 Total War while you finish that up. Funnily enough, samurai go down pretty easy, but they're so damn many of em. Where'd I put that gattling gun...

[DnBrn47]

Is this going to be compatible with Albion Prelude?

[mr.bear]

yeah I guess I'll have to make it AP compatible now. (but not on the first release)

it doesn't rely on anything inside the game universe whatsoever, so it'll just need the odd tweak to make it AP compatible. I'll have to obtain a copy for debugging...

EDIT: Just out of interest, how many of you out there are albion preluders?

[GameDrifter]

I more or less play it on new starts now. The stock Exchange a nice way to get a quick leg up on money just starting out. The totally pointless Terran/Argon looping war thing is annoying since there never is a winner it seems.. But the newer ships and stuff is cool. I do have 2 long term saved games I play in TC itself but I got time invested so not willing to just move on till I feel I gotten done what needs doing in those two games.

[DnBrn47]

yeah I guess I'll have to make it AP compatible now. (but not on the first release)

it doesn't rely on anything inside the game universe whatsoever, so it'll just need the odd tweak to make it AP compatible. I'll have to obtain a copy for debugging...

EDIT: Just out of interest, how many of you out there are albion preluders?

I'd be fine with just TC compatible but I never got into TC enough, I've been hooked on AP however, I don't see me going back to TC just for a mod even though that never ending war does get boring... I've tried to go deep into terran space and blow stuff up myself but they have never ending RRFs so eventually I have to just jump away.

I can't imagine it'd be too difficult like you said, I have the old pirate guild and yaki armada going in AP and the last update for that was a couple years ago. I was just curious, maybe you won't need to do anything. I think AP is worth it just for the stuff that was added.