Crime & Punishment

Why is there piracy in highsec?

Because as the game currently exists there is very little reason for prey to be in lowsec.

Running missions? More ISK/hour in highsec where you can safely bling your boat, autopilot between systems, and so on. Lowsec you really want to spend slots on a warp scrambler and a buffer tank, both of which cost you speed in PVE.
Incursions? Again almost all done in high.
Mining? It's much more profitable to mine in 6 Mackinaw alts in highsec than to run any ops in low.
Factional Warfare? This might be lowsec only, but it is too unlikely to land tackles on the bears there and even if you get one, their boats are usually dirt cheap, hence little ransom capacity.

When prey move, predators need to move with them or die out, and CCP's changes over the years have driven prey out of lowsec, except for one type of prey: Exploration bears. There's not enough of them to sustain a healthy predator population on their own.

Let's hope that Odyssey adds in new types of lowsec prey - tag farmers, grav site hunters, and the like.

I'm sorry, I thought I made it quite clear with that declaration that my tongue was firmly in my cheek. I thought getting a crown from Burger King was a dead giveaway. It's just for a laugh.

Now, with regards to whether or not what I do is piracy, I think it's fairly absurd to think that being a -10 in lowsec constitutes piracy any more than what I do does. If piracy is preying on trade and doing unexpected violence to peoples boats, then what I do is closer to piracy simply because of the amount of targets here in highsec. What I see from lowsec -10s is much more often small gang fights for no real purpose other than to fight. While that is fun and if often very high skilled pvp, that's not piracy. Targetting non-combat ships for profit appears to be the minority work in lowsec.

That's something that pains me greatly, though, as you are correct in that there was a time when pirates were in lowsec and the stories told from that era are fantastic. Lowsec is hurting and it needs help. I empathize very deeply and, while I'm not a lowsec dude, I spend a fair amount of time trying to understand their plight in the hope that I can contribute something to their betterment.

I saw the argument that the word piracy should remain with lowsec -10s because at one point piracy was much more popular in lowsec than elsewhere. There are two problems there: firstly, that's not how the word works, as it's used as a descriptor for an activity. It's not a club, it's an activity. If I were claiming to be a Tusker then there would be legitimate issue here. Secondly, while I would love to see the breath of life blown back into lowsec piracy, that is not where it is currently most popular. That's not due to the pirates there, but rather due to the prey, or lack of. The tags for sec change will hopefully help that. Literally two weeks ago I was talking with a lowsec entity trying to wrap my head around how lowsec could be raised from the half-dead and exactly the system CCP announced was proposed. I think that will do well.

It's also been mentioned that I use tools that people find unfair. My use of neutral logi in safaris and alts were mentioned specifically. These things are immaterial to the discussion of whether or not what I do is piracy, but I'd like to talk about these two things anyways. Neutral logi in safaris is broken. It's so incredibly broken. When it eventually gets fixed I will be over the moon and I hope it happens sooner, rather than later. In the mean time, I would be an idiot to not avail myself of the best tools avalible to me, especially in face of the fact my opponents will hold no such reservations. There is no bushido in space.

As for alts and the inability of people to apply consequences to my main, I don't think that's what's stopping people, but if this were possible, I would love it. It would mean that wardecs, a mechanic that is still not in a good place, would be more poignant in that when people logged to go play on their alts I could go bother them there, too. Increased ability to apply consequences are something I would welcome with open arms because those tools are given to me, too.

Another thing that I've seen in this thread that I'd like to address, and that's the arguement that highsec should be a kiddy pool where nobody can be bothered and everyone should spend a couple of week there before moving to lowsec or nullsec. This is completely divorced from reality. Highsec has the greatest concentration of wealth, has many inherent advantages over other areas of space (I'm thinking specifically of manufactuing here) and contains players running several billions of isk in marauders and pirate BS. While it may have at one time been the intent that highsec should be the newbie area, that is not the effect and at this point basically no change will make it so.

As to the argument that any ill effect to players would cause them to quit and hurt CCP's revenue and ultimately destroy the game, I have two counter-arguements. Firstly, if someone wanted to be entirely safe or removed from the effects of other people, literally any other game, MMO or single player, would be a better choice. EvE was built on this specific niche and is basically the only place you can go to scratch that itch, and trying to change it for a think-of-the-children arguement is somewhat shortsighted. Secondly, you assume that the work we do doesn't generate or keep more subscriptions than we cause to leave. The arc from drake to golem to quitting in boredom is a well-travelled one and leads to players wandering off elsewhere to find the fun, whereas logging on to crush your enemies (whether that makes you good guy or bad guy) has staying power, and I know that for myself and many of my peers, the stories of GHSC and the Suddenly Ninjas dudes were a huge inspiration and caused many people to go get involved in each others business, looking to generate some content.

(That wasn't meant to be as big a wall of text as it was. My bad.)

fake edit: also, some of my replies earlier in this thread were fairly flippant and had a mildly hostile undercurrent to them. I'm sorry. I've had a snickers and a nap and I'm much better now.

Piracy is typically an act of robbery or criminal violence at sea. The term can include acts committed on land, in the air, or in other major bodies of water or on a shore.

Clueless much? Or do you just like to think of your self as more "Elite" than others?

I have been playing for 2/ half years now. When people talk about piracy in EVE I think about it in an eve sense.

I am still "old minded" in the sense of Piracy. I firmly believe you cannot be called a pirate if your not chased by every single authority in highsec because your -10.

If your not flashing as a threat in low sec I just cannot think of that person as a pirate. Which bring me to another point and this might be a unpopular view.

Before I start, I will say as I always said. I do not care how people play the game, I do not care how you kill ships or what game mechanics you use that is offered to do so. Just don't sugar coat it as something else.

I have always believed that if I am going to go after a target I want them to know that I am a threat and that I am coming. Same with -10 players, when you jump into lowsec and you see a -10 player on gate you know he is a threat. Awoxers does not produce that fear when seen as a corpmate. I cannot and never will shoot at a target considering me a corp mate (unless he shoots at me). I don't like it, never have. but I don't care either that others are doing it.

What does bug me is the growing number of new players calling themselves PVPrs, Mercs, Pirates in BU doing Awoxing. They are not and never will be anything but a Blue/Green killer in my eyes. That is a pretty stubborn mindset I got with regards to how I see things but that is what got me to this point in EVE.

However... we seem to have gotten of track in this thread.

I voted for you man, will again next year.

Edit: All hail the pirate king

+5

Semantics aside, Monk's opened up a lot of people's eyes to what they could be doing, and how they can do it.

That can only be a good thing.

Nice hat btw.

so you didn't make it to CSM.... that's good

A lot of the pirate outfits I grew up with since beta flew roamed and choked between null-sec and the entrance to high-sec space. It wasn't primarily just about low-sec space to get lower security. It was about finding those trade routes, those miners and those ratters who dared enough to come into dangerous space. Sometimes that meant flying to null-sec to find mining crews mining the rarest of ore in space. Sometimes that meant patrolling around in null-sec to find stragglers ratting the rarest of rats in space. Sometimes that even meant finding secret trade routes where traders are moving goods from one low-sec hub to the next to help feed those early pilots trying to control the universe.

Either way, null-sec or low security, both types of space was about piracy and control. Today, most of the alliances have killed that spirit with their blobs of new recruits and greed to control the universe rather than making a quick coin.

Funny how you look at what EVE has become today. Trade routes exist, but you have jump freighters and elite industrials that can even cloak in space with free warp-to-zero in every system. Then you have worm holes and complexes that delay the discovery time of roaming pirates looking for a quick snack or worse, simply ratting in high-sec space because it was still viable with missions before they moved them out to more dangerious space. Lastly, mining... Let's not go there.

Then some of you have to audacity to question why I said increasing high-sec criminal activity would make alot of people leave. Have most of you not seen the amount of changes that's happened over the years that have contributed to degrading piracy? Most of those changes happened to help protect carebears to minimize their losses so they would quit crying. And I'm not just talking about those in high-sec space either.

Eve is a game about space, therefor the term of piracy is "Space Piracy" the definition is still the same. Why does piracy need to be connected to a -10 alt?

Piracy has evolved in to space, why cant it evolve further to gain the trust of targets and then take them for all you can get.

You have an old school out dated and frankly pretentious view of "Piracy"

High value targets are in high sec, while low value faction warfare frigs / cruisers fill low..... smart choice is to move to the money.

We all know low sec is not in a good place, but you fix it by championing ideas and CSM candidates to help it. You don't help low sec by taking a crap on some one who is trying to champion a game play style similar to yours.

And before you say it yes the game play is similar, you blow people up and demand ransoms and so do we, same exact end goal but different execution.