quote:
Does this limit you to kind of a small area of operations?
It sure does. For the first while, you are going to be limited to a three-or four system maximum range.
Note: once your ships get out there & capture a ship, its OK if they run out of supplies on the way home. You can resupply them with another ship, or bring in a SYS to analyse and scrap.
[quoye]Seems like you would need to wait for an alien race to sort of blunder over your initial start area before you could really get into action.[/quote]
In the 100-system game I started, there were three races within 3 systems from me (15 races total). In a 250 system game, you have to travel much farther, but that's what 5kT supply storage pods are for.
PS. Please don't tell me you still have engines that store more supplies than a box of supplies the same size!?!
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It's too bad we can't build facilities on asteroids since the asteroid pirate hideout seems to crop in sci-fi novels etc quite a bit. I agree pirates shouldn't be colonizing much if at all, but the idea of hidden supply bases on moons or asteroids would have been interesting. Maybe even one pirate haven, the homeworld with minor intel facilities etc, although it should be possible to build a ship/base intel component.
Hidden supply bases, are merely space stations with a cloak or in a storm system. By fleeting with the base, you get resupplied, and the base probably has a construction component for repairs/retrofits/analysing/scrapping, so you don't need a planet out there.
If you also put your base in a shield-depleting storm, you can whomp on the helpless attack ships' hulls with armored ships
Thing is, you don't really need intel to survive as a pirate. If you have no planets, then the other players can't make contact with you, and you are impervious to intel.