How did the mauraders build the tripolis?

[Aury]

That's something that I can' t really understand. The Mauarders seem less organized than the Charon pirates; yet they have the bigger, better more powerful ships. I can buy that it means they can get better loot, and thus they can afford the better equipment, but it seems entirely beyond them to construct capital ships. It would make sense that they were somehow getting the drakes from the charon, and that they were rigging the raid platforms together themselves, but the tripoli seems ... too far a stretch. And nobody else uses triplolis, so I can't see them as having gotten them from someone else, as they are after all decent ships.

[Drako Slyith]

I think somewhere it says that the Marauders are an offshoot of the Charon, so perhaps they are funded by the Charon as a further influence. Or they could steal the ships from Charons and so they pool all their resources into the Tripolis. Also, tripolis are rare, maybe one every couple of systems. That is within reason for a group of pirates.

[Aury]

Don't really see the charon funding them all that much when the charon have seriously inferior equipment.

Also, tripolis can be pretty common. I've had 3 in a system before, along with 2 raid platforms

[Drako Slyith]

hmmmm... never seen that. I guess it doesn't quite match up. Perhaps the Charon pirates themselves were split from the Marauders, taking their ships with them. The more advanced Tripolis were kept with the Marauders, but without the rest of the Charons, the Marauders have fallen to decay, losing their money, but keeping their ships.

[RPC]

It depends on how you view the relationship between the Marauders and Charon. The game says that they are related, but does not elaborate.
There are two cases that we can consider:
a: Charon and Marauder are related in such a way that they are two factions within a bigger group. In that case, the Marauders have bigger guns because they need bigger guns to fight off the Sung and Dwarg, who may be encroaching upon their area.
b: Charon and Marauder split off at some point ago (as hinted in the OP). That would give rise to the question in the OP. Who knows?
Tripolis have 12 blast plate, 4 turbolaser cannons, NAMI missile launcher, class III deflector and a 100MW reactor.
2000(12)+ 1500(4)+ 1000+ 4000+ 10000= 23400
Drakes have 12 advanced reactive, NAMI missile, & 2 laser cannons and apparently does not even have a reactor (there wasn't even a reactorpower=""!).
600(12)+ 1000+ 250= 1970.
The difference in cost (all values are unadjusted from the .tdb. I am using base values here.) 21430, is an immense spike.
However, take a look at Raid platforms:
Raid platforms have reinforcedtitanium2(x36)+2 turbolasers+ 100MW reactor=
500(36) +1500(2)+ 10000= 31000.
Since Raid platforms cost more (assuming they buy all the equipment from somewhere), it remains to say that since the OP agrees to the existence of the Raid platform, and that raid platforms cost more than Tripolis, Tripolis therefore can be theoretically be made on the basis that since raid platforms cost more, and since raid platforms can be made, so too can Triplolis [because the marauders can just buy the equipment].

[Aury]

In reality though, titanium barriers are theoretically easier to obtain, because of their lower level and mass production (ie, used in stations & construction) Not to mention that salvage ships are built with them as well.

Given the size of the tripoli, it actually should have a bit more armor plating, but given balancing is required, it may or may not actually need that.

Then there is the base cost of the hull & secondary systems you don't actually see in-game. Not to mention the complexity of the design of the tripoli is significantly greater than that of the raid platform.

And you can't forget the cost of the ammunition - I've seen Tripoli's running around with XM900's, and those in any significant quantity can cost quite a bit.

[Drako Slyith]

Also, it looks like the raid platform is cobbled together from salvaged weapons and devices. I believe this supports my theory that the marauders are dieing off without the Charons. They were no longer able to create more Tripolis, so they salvage and cobble together ships.

[Aury]

I'd say they are doing better than the charon overall, given that they generally have better stuff altegother, though they lack the organization needed to do real shipbuilding (ie, why the raid platforms would be cobbled together, not because they are dying off)

[Drako Slyith]

Perhaps. The tripolis could be leftovers from a time when they were well organized and strong, but were sent into chaos by the seperation of the Charons? The charons mediated the disputes, but then they split and the chaos ensued.

[Song]

"How did the marauders build the Tripolis?"

They built it very carefully, one would assume.




I look at the raid platform not as a "they can't build better", but as a "designed to a purpose"

Think. It's designed for raiding, and not for combat against warships. It's escorted by a fleet of "smash and grab" ships, which do ALL combat when possible. The raid platform supports the gunships, and provides storage space and light back-up firepower. Think "CSC, only cheaper, inferior, smaller, and owned by pirates". No reason to assume they're cobbled together from scrap. On the contrary, they're crude but functional mobile bases that perform well for a specific purpose, and are used well to that purpose. Once they get into combat with warships though....their design lets them down. Fast.

At least, that's how I see them.

[sdw195]

"How did the marauders build the Tripolis?"

Someone entered into the debug console

Code: Select all

(sysCreateShip &scTripoli; gmaruaderHQ &svpirates;)

[PKodon]

How?

One piece at a time?

Perhaps they buy them from the Romulans, like the Klingons did their early ships (and we just don't go that direction in the Vanilla game, so we don't run into them)? <Well, the Transcendence version of "Romulans">

[Aury]

I must say SDW195's theory is one of the best yet that I've seen so far

[sdw195]

I must say SDW195's theory is one of the best yet that I've seen so far

*Sdw195 does a happy dance*

[Amilir]

Instead of 'how' I'll start with 'why'. Marauders needed something that could stand up to the militia. It's pretty well suited for this purpose. Four turbolasers -- shieldbusting. Barbaries can emp most of the weaker ships as soon as shields are down. Blast plate -- anti Manticore. Sure, TeVs are ubiquitous, but they don't pack a big punch. Almost everything that could do a lot of damage before getting EMPed uses blast. NAMI -- anti capship. Obvious enough. Actually, that's probably all irrelevant. I do have a hypothesis though:

The maruaders are mercs for the corporate hierarchy (or BM). Really, everything else in this zone uses its own civ's tech. Marauders use commonwealth tech. They must be getting it somehow. Now you have a willing and half suicidal force that will kill anything in sight for a little profit. All you'd have to do is sell some goods at cost and point them in the right direction. Basically, financing the scum is cheaper than hiring a decent military force.