1.21/1.32 BUG (Savegame included) Reported to police for killing pirates/defending my trader - Possible fix in 1.50b4

[Kryten42]

So this just happened to me:

One of my two autotrading freighters was attacked by a ship in Argon Prime, I told it to dock at the nearest station and flew there ( I was pretty close). When I arrived, the attacker was hovering by the station, waiting for my freighter to undock...which it did because I forgot that it had a default action. The attacker was apparently a Pirate, a Kestrel from Hatikwas freedom (or something similar) Faction, which was alreaedy at -30 and red to me. When it started to follow and shoot my trader again, I shot it down. After the first hit someone warned me to stop that aggression and after I destroyed it I got reported to the police for doing so. Strangely I was reported for shooting at the station, while I was nowhere near aiming at it...I was flying away from it when I shot at the pirate in clear space. After reporting, an Argon police nearby turned red and the reputation showed -19 on it for the Argon Federation. That shocked me, because I was at +12 with them. This policevessel did not attack me though, it seemed to fly its usual patrol some kilometers away. When I clicked the station, it still showed me the +12 for Argon Federation, while the policevessel showed -19 for the same faction.

This is wrong and confusing on multiple levels. I should not get reported by anyone for shooting down an aggressive pirate which attacks my ships. The fact that I was reported by an uninvolved station from a different faction is what makes this so confusing.

I quit the game after, because I dont want to risk my standing or any other confusing/buggy consequences. I will load up the previous save again and if I can reproduce this, I could upload it then.

[Kryten42]

I tested it again with 1.31 and this still happens. I can reproduce it easily and have uploaded a savegame. In that savegame I am fighting the pirate, who is shooting at my freighter. I shot him once, got a warning from someone else(I guess a station again) and then I saved the game. If you load it and kill the pirate, you will get reported to the police by a station(not sure which though, probably the last one my freighter docked at: the wharf) for an unauthorized kill and one police ship will turn red and show a -19 reputation for argon federation. All other argon targets show the +12 I have with them and that police ship so seems to not go after me.

Please look into this and fix it, so I can defend my traders. If this is not a bug and I missed something, then please explain.

Link to savegame:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/gwhwdl

[stopherr]

Doesn't the Argons protect HAT? I think they are allies.

[Kryten42]

Ok, that would explain it a bit, but they should not be allowed to pirate other freighters in Argon space then. It makes no sense otherwise.
At least I need to be able to defend my freighters and think that once they attack traders doing business there, they should be treated like any other criminal/pirate.

[Uileat]

If the pirates are disguised as a faction, try scanning them before attacking so they are revealed as pirates.

[Kryten42]

The pirate attacked my trader after I told it to escape, that pretty much revealed them as pirates to me. Also its red/hostile to me even before I attack.

When your trader is attacked by a hostile ship, do you scan it first?

[Shimenki]

This happened to me as well and it was very confusing as a noob wondering what the parameters are in this game.

The ship showed as red right away so I don't think it was hiding anything

[Kryten42]

So, if it is a bug, please fix it.
If it is a feature, please correct it We should be able to defend our ships, better yet it if friends of Argon would not be allowed to do pirate stuff in Argon space.

[Uileat]

Here's an example of what happens in my game. I approach a fully red Ministry Kestrel that ordered my trader to drop cargo. I scan him and the name turns blue, but the bottom faction bar stays red. Then I Comm him and just say goodbye. The pirate "re-disguises" as a Teladi and is all blue, not red anymore. He is still spouting about dropping cargo but is no longer attacking.

I've seen this behavior where the pirate morphs to different factions so it is not always the same. I think I have to agree with you that having it have any faction so that you take a faction hit doesn't seem right. Seems to me that when you scan them they should be revealed as Pirate faction, but perhaps that is missing from X4? I am interested to hear an official clarification on whether this is a bug.

[Kryten42]

Funny thing: I just saw their video for upcoming 1.5 and 2.0 Updates, and around the 10 minute mark you can see this happening.

[FutileSine]

Yup, just has same thing on 1.32:

MIN flagged pirate vessel orders my freighter to drop it's legal cargo. Freighter is told to run, I boost over there *specifically* scan it since I've heard of this problem before. Still red, attacks me. I destroy it, and am immediately penalized and reported to sector security... bug?

[Kryten42]

I would like some response on this too now.
I tried to have my trader escape and repair without detroying that pirate now, and when my trader docks somwhere for a while the pirate turns blue again and seems to go on with his normal buisiness. I forgot about him pretty fast and after a while remembered that my trader was still sitting in that station. So I ordered it to autotrade again and guess what happened? That same pirate (still a bit damaged) shows up again, turns red when he gets close and attacks my trader again after demanding the cargo(trader has no wares atm)!
I set a scout to defend the trader now and together they might be able to, I really hope I don't get reported to the police then again.

[furirkeeper]

This has been happening since version 1.0 and is really annoying. Even more so now when more pirates are around. This must be fixed as it is clearly a bug. In my case (v1.32) my trader was asked to drop cargo and after that attacked by a HAT fighter (-30 rep, while my general rep with HAT is +4). I scanned the fighter which just revealed it as HAT still with -30 rep. But the order of the fighter was "patrol", maybe that is where the bug is. Anyway, I defended my transport and destroyed the fighter and was reported to station security and got a penalty to rep.

So maybe the cause of the bug is that the attacker is set to order "patrol"? Just a guess.

[Kryten42]

I got -3 rep now with HAT after my trader successfully defended itself.
I've seen other posts about this now, so maybe this will get some attention soon. Until this is resolved, I set my global behaviour to 'escape' if someone demands the cargo dropped.

I have no problem with pirates in disguise, or reptutation loss with their faction. Getting reported to police and loosing reputation for defending myself is something else though. That makes no sense and should be changed! The police in any controlled system should be helping against such pirates, not the other way around.

[Naalei]

Hello,

I think there is a bug with "first shooter" and laws in sectors but I think there is also a mistake from some players with the "red" color.

The red color means it is one of the player enemy, not an enemy for all factions.
If you start attacking a trader in argon system, it will turn red but only for the player faction. Argons will still see him as blue.
So I think the pirate is not correctly managed as when he attack a ship, he is not told by the sector faction to stop and does not turn red for the faction.

Here is how I think the system should be (only my personal thought !)
There are lots of possible situations but the 6 mains are :
- A ship (lets say, SOP) attack an ARG combat ship (because it is war) in an ARG sector
-> This ship should be marked as a criminal in that sector (so for ARG and ARG's allies)
-> This ship is not a pirate (he attacked a combat ship during a war)
-> If player shoot this ship in ARG sector, he should gain rep with ARG (criminal), and lose rep with ship faction (SOP)
-> If player shoot this ship in SOP sector, he should only lose rep with ship faction (SOP)
-> If player shoot this ship in an ARG's Ally sector, he should gain rep with the sector faction and lose rep with ship faction (SOP)
-> If player shoot this ship in a SOP's ally sector, he should lose rep with the sector faction and ship faction (SOP)
- A ship (SOP) attack or harass a cargo ship (any faction)
-> It should be automatically marked as a pirate
-> Anyone killing him should gain rep with the sector faction (except if sector is a pirate sector) no matter the ship original faction and maybe lose rep with pirate factions

- The player attack a combat ship which is not a pirate or criminal
-> lose reps with ship faction
-> if the sector is allied to the ship, player should be warned and lose rep with sector faction
-> if the sector is not allied to the ship, player should not be warned and should not lose or gain rep.
-> sector turns red after the warning (if sector is allied to the ship of course)
- The player attack a cargo ship which is not a pirate or criminal
-> lose rep with sector and ship faction
-> sector police turns red
-> if player leave the sector, the sector and police turns back to blue after maybe 10 minutes
- The player attack a pirate
-> gain rep with sector faction (if not pirate)
-> lose rep with pirate factions (replace ship faction)
- The player attack a war criminal
-> gain rep with sector faction if sector is an enemy of the ship
-> lose rep with ship faction

I saw in the game files that all ships have jobs so I think it is quite easy for the game to know if the attacked ship is a military ship or not

I surely missed something that may compromise all my thought but well... I would like the game to be like that

[Kryten42]

yeah, I am fully aware that something in red is not by default hostile to all others as well, but thats not the problem here. I agree with the rest, thats how I would think it should be and I guess thats also how it was planned to be here.
Something is just not working right, maybe its just a bug that pirating ships are not recognized as such when they do criminal actions and such are not flagged as criminals/hostiles. It would be logical then that the player gets problems for killing them. If thats the case I guess it could be fixed rather easily(I hope).

Since I have seen more posts about this bug now, it would be really great to get some response on this. A statement like "we are looking into this" would make me happy

[siath70]

I said in another thread I have been mid fight with a SCA pirate and had it switch its IFF to another faction and I got in trouble.

SCA should not be allowed to switch their IFF once they have been discovered.

I have also noticed factions not reacting to Pirates that are red too. Even your own fighters set to patrol a sector or that are escorting freighters get confused and do not attack SCA pirates. This whole IFF switch thing needs to be looked into.

Maybe a mod to fix it for now?

[Alex Chaos]

got this too push it

[Murtagh21]

Same

[djokoss22]

Same. I have a lot of problems with ships marked as enemy and switching of faction multiple times (marked as ARG then switch to MIN then SCA then MIN, etc.. in a couple of seconds).
And, if you fire at them, you get reported and loose reputation. You can't defend your other ships from pirates without loosing reputation.
This bug is really annoying.

EDIT:
Here is a video in which you can see the enemy's faction randomly changing
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mVRMeMLqxg