After Outlaw Sectors, pirates always attack even with 0 bounty

[Liudeius]

After getting the Outlaw Sectors DLC, pirates always attack me, even when I've had 0 bounty for the entire game. I'll watch the bidding, never see any money go towards attacking me, and still, I'm one of the targets.
This has happened in probably around five games against the AI, at least one game in each race. Sometimes it doesn't happen for the first or second raid, and sometimes later in the game it stops happening.

Is this intended to happen? Is this a bug? It's really annoying to have constantly devote resources to pirate defense.

[Yarlen]

That's by design when you have Outlaw Sectors enabled in the gameplay options. They will continue to attack random targets once their primary is taken out.

[Liudeius]

I guess a developer would know, but are you sure we're talking about the same thing?
They'll attack me as a primary target, with the sword appearing next to my name the moment the raid is called and showing up in my system before any other target if my system is closest.
See the following image:
https://i.imgur.com/cpsysWJ.jpg
I was still an immediate primary target the moment the raid was called, even with 0 bounty myself and 6 other targets at 1000+ bounty.

It can't be very randomized if it's usually the 2-3 highest bids and the 0 bounty player (actually here they ignored a 1296 bid to attack 1250 and although not in the screenshot, I've noticed them ignoring bounties 1000 higher than their lowest non-player target).

If it is randomized and I've just had awful luck (the early game of five games in a row), I submit that it would be a better idea to make them attack based on highest bounties and never attack 0 bounty. The bounty system is useless if they just "randomly" choose their targets anyway.
Before it felt like a forced bid because attacking only the highest bid target meant everything rested on just another bid of 250, now I don't even bid because I know I'm always going to be attacked anyway (early game) and they'll ignore my bids on whim.

[Yarlen]

It could be one of the AI players put a pirate mission against you.

[Liudeius]

Unless I'm mistaken, pirate missions set the attack the moment the mission is assigned, not once the bounty timer ticks down to 0.
But if it is, then the AI seems overly eager to set pirate missions on the player over other AI, because this has happened for most of the early game seven games in a row (I went back and counted my saves), and most of those games I have not been especially aggressive towards the AI at the point the attacks start.

[Ceejay]

Originally posted by Liudeius:

Unless I'm mistaken, pirate missions set the attack the moment the mission is assigned, not once the bounty timer ticks down to 0.
But if it is, then the AI seems overly eager to set pirate missions on the player over other AI, because this has happened for most of the early game seven games in a row (I went back and counted my saves), and most of those games I have not been especially aggressive towards the AI at the point the attacks start.

I must admit while it maybe things going on in the background that explain it, they do seem to target the human players alot, also if your on 0 bounty or you pay for them to attack someone else, and you still get attacked, that seems a little harsh.

As above it does kind of make the whole paying them to attack someone else other than you a bit pointless.

[Vincent Red]

I've just downloaded the DLC and have the same problem. Pirates atack me every turn despite bounty size and they get stronger each turn. Any idea how to deal with this? Can change some setting or uninstall this DLC? I don't want to turn the pirates off

[GoaFan77]

Originally posted by Vincent Red:

I've just downloaded the DLC and have the same problem. Pirates atack me every turn despite bounty size and they get stronger each turn. Any idea how to deal with this? Can change some setting or uninstall this DLC? I don't want to turn the pirates off

Disable pirates or outlaw sectors (I think) and they either won't attack or it will go to the old behavior.

[Shellbie]

Pirates are the best source of xp in the game.

[chaosbringer42]

Originally posted by Liudeius:

After getting the Outlaw Sectors DLC, pirates always attack me, even when I've had 0 bounty for the entire game. I'll watch the bidding, never see any money go towards attacking me, and still, I'm one of the targets.
This has happened in probably around five games against the AI, at least one game in each race. Sometimes it doesn't happen for the first or second raid, and sometimes later in the game it stops happening.

Is this intended to happen? Is this a bug? It's really annoying to have constantly devote resources to pirate defense.

1 pirate base in each star sends an attack every time the timer runs down to 0. The top 2 bounties get extra ships coming in the attack (this includes bounties of 0). The player wins ties (aka you get attacked if bounties arent placed). These attacks are free xp for your capships, since after the first attack you know where they are coming from.

[Vincent Red]

Originally posted by GoaFan77:

Originally posted by Vincent Red:

I've just downloaded the DLC and have the same problem. Pirates atack me every turn despite bounty size and they get stronger each turn. Any idea how to deal with this? Can change some setting or uninstall this DLC? I don't want to turn the pirates off

Disable pirates or outlaw sectors (I think) and they either won't attack or it will go to the old behavior.

I think I know what the problem is: Top 2 bounties get raided when you play on medium map (4 players). That's why I got raided every turn. How Do I turn off the DLC? They are not in the mod menu

[Jokery]

i usually attack same time as pirates helps with clearing the planet :D and nice boost in exp if they arent allies+ add another mission to pirates to attack doubling the amount of ships :D

[Ardanis]

Originally posted by Vincent Red:

How Do I turn off the DLC? They are not in the mod menu

In the map settings when you start a new game, along with fleet size, alliance lock, victory conditions etc.