Killer pirates in 1.83

[spara]

I've been testing and I'm fairly sure pirate hermits have something to do with it. The AI just doesn't obey me . I'm obviously doing something wrong at the moment.

[spara]

This is driving me nuts.

With an untouched pirate hermit, the added pirates (with the station as their leader) get a sudden urge to leave the hermit. AI probably sends them on a mission or something. Setting destination to the hermit and ordering them to come home gets instantly reseted to what ever they have earlier decided to do.

The interesting thing is with a relocated hermit. The hermit gets moved at populator step after the core population has happened and all of a sudden the pirates added around the station seem to like the new place. No going anywhere, just loitering around the station, just like they should.

[Cody]

This is driving me nuts.

<chuckles>

I'm about three-quarters through that cross-charter, and I've never seen so many milk runs - Lord Effingham's Revenge is completely unscathed!

[spara]

It's about the position. It must be about the position. The first position for some reason makes the pirates fly away, while in the second position they just loiter around. I'll crack this yet. I'll probably need to write a custom AI, instead of using a core one. I was trying to avoid that .

[Fritz]

I've done practically nothing with AIs... but how can using, even misusing one for one ship or a group of ships change the behaviour of many other ships?

On the other hand, I'm sure, there must be a connection between ships using the same AI, something like a global variable that shouldn't be global. I've described some strange AI behaviour for traders. One event I didn't mention because nobody seemed interested anyhow, involved practically every trader in a system showing the same absurd behaviour. This couldn't have been a coincidence, because this behaviour is rare, so there must have been something affecting all traders.

I don't know if there is a direct connection to your problem, but I just wanted to say that whatever is happening isn't necessarily your fault.

[spara]

Sure there might be bugs, but I'm well aware that I'm not thoroughly understanding the AI. Especially grouping and leading seem to happen somewhere behind the scenes. At least my feeble attempts to create sanely behaving groups seem to be futile. That's why I'm trying my best to use the core features as much s possible. We'll see, I might be progressing. Or not.

[Fritz]

Btw, I never had the impression that the pirates have become better or significantly more than they used to be.

Hm. I didn't play much during the hermit testing phase, and perhaps I have to withdraw this statement. What just happened at Laxema witchpoint was unusually massive for a pirate attack...

[Fritz]

Another thing, perhaps not connected: Many hermit pirates behave strangely. The amount of them fleeing on attack seems very high, and some of those attacking themselves turn away before I even target them. Perhaps adding an injector gives them additional incentive to flee? Or is something "missing" in their AIs? On the other hand, I have been attacked quite heavily near pirate hermits, so this behaviour doesn't occur always.

[spara]

Finally got them to stick around. Looks like the only sensible solution is to write a custom pirate AI for hermit protectors. Oh well, I'm on the right track again, but it's getting late. I'll get back to it tomorrow.

And in case someone's wondering, what's going on, here's a little explanation. When stars are at the right position, the pirates launched by the pirate hermit decide to go looking for victims instead of just staying with their leader, which is the station. This part is a bit fuzzy for me, but that's what seems to happen. Then the hermit notes that it's loyal protectors have ditched and decides to launch another bunch of boneheads who again decide to head somewhere elsewhere and so on and so on. Cody's report suggests that they have an urgent meeting at the witchpoint.

[Fritz]

Hm, I didn't have the impression that the pirates leave the rock hermit vicinity.

[Cody]

No positive result from the cross-chart contract - 'twas a milk run all the way!

Cody's report suggests that they have an urgent meeting at the witchpoint.

I've encountered killer pirates all along route one, not only at the witchpoint - or do I misunderstand? I'm good at that.
I wonder if they're raiding close-by higher TL systems after leaving their hermits - that's in the pirate AI somewhere?

[spara]

That's one of the fuzzy parts. Sometimes they seem to stick with the station and sometimes not when using generic pirateAI. Those meetings at the station might have some other explanation, like someone having trouble docking.

I observed many, many times pirates heading away right after launch. But that's gonna change, I'll modify the AI for protectors so that they stay. And I'll also change the pirate hermit AI so that there's only a limited number of protectors around.

No positive result from the cross-chart contract - 'twas a milk run all the way!

Cody's report suggests that they have an urgent meeting at the witchpoint.

I've encountered killer pirates all along route one, not only at the witchpoint - or do I misunderstand? I'm good at that.
I wonder if they're raiding close-by higher TL systems after leaving their hermits - that's in the pirate AI somewhere?

Yep. They might be anywhere looking for suitable victims in growing numbers.

[Fritz]

A system starts to live (and the hermit starts to spawn pirates) the moment you enter the system. Until the first pirate from the hermit arrives at the witchpoint, you would be far away, so usually, you wouldn't notice any accumulation there. But if the pirate hermit is on the WP route, the pirates would meet you on their way to the witchpoint. "My" pirate hermit is far away from the witchpoint and the planet on the PS route, and perhaps this causes a different pirate behaviour.

The cowardliness of the pirates has probably a simple reason: They don't act as a group, they are single pirates, each one too weak to attack a ship like mine. If I attack one, the others don't help, so most of them choose to flee.

[Cody]

They might be anywhere looking for suitable victims in growing numbers.

<grins> Invasion of the Killer Pirates!

[maik]

They might be anywhere looking for suitable victims in growing numbers.

<grins> Invasion of the Killer Pirates!

...From Outer Space!