Pirates and Space Squids

[Brids17]

How exactly are you supposed to deal with these? My first game placed me only a few stars away from a 18K pirate base. I figured I was just unlucky and started a new game, which I was wiped out in the first two years when a 1.5K fleet of squids wiped out my fleet and starbase. And now with my third game I'm surrounded by 1K+ pirate fleets, severely restricting where I can go and explore. Am I just getting extremely unlucky or is there some way you're supposed to handle this that I'm missing?

[tempest.of.emptiness]

How to deal with non-player hostiles:

1) Explore with science vessels, which will flee from hostile enemies but allow you to see their fleet strength.
2) Avoid systems containing hostile enemies until your fleet strength is ~1.5x theirs.
3) Go kill the hostile enemy.
4) Bring your fleet back to a starbase to repair. Build more ships to replace any losses.
5) Have a science ship analyze any debris left behind in the battle.
6) If there are any hostiles left, return to 2.

With the exception of rare circumstances like having a mobile hostle group happen to show up in the same place as one of your fleets, or the occasional science ship that fails to flee in time, you should never lose a fleet with this method.

[Alugere]

Also of note: only the event pirates leave their system. The 18k old guard pirates never leave their system and there is only one of them in the entire map.

[Rhudda]

Originally posted by tempest.of.emptiness:

the occasional science ship that fails to flee in time

For precisely this reason it's wiser to send out a single corvette to probe systems. You can set it to avoid just like a science ship, so it'll behave in the same way, and you don't risk losing a scientist who'll cost you influence to replace.