pirates with long range weapons

[currierm]

I just started a new game with pirates set to normal and they've all got lasers with a range of 320. Is this normal? I'm finding it impossible to defeat any pirates, even micromanaging my ships (destroyer + frigate vs. one pirate escort). They just fly outside my weapon range and snipe at my shields until they're gone. Is there any way to counter this?

One thing I did this game was load a set of ship designs from a file. Seemed like a convenient way to avoid redoing all my designs. Does this mean the pirates suddenly have access to all sorts of components that I can't use yet? If so, it seems like this "feature" is utterly busted. They really need to come up with a better algorithm for how to outfit the pirate ships....

[WoodMan]

Are there more advanced civs in the game than you?  Pirates get ship designs from their "prey", so for example in my game there was a Quameno Empire with a higher tech level than me to my right and another Human civ with the same tech level as me to the left.  Pirates to my left used basic tech like me, pirates to my right had more advanced weapons.

[Foraven]

ORIGINAL: currierm

I just started a new game with pirates set to normal and they've all got lasers with a range of 320. Is this normal? I'm finding it impossible to defeat any pirates, even micromanaging my ships (destroyer + frigate vs. one pirate escort). They just fly outside my weapon range and snipe at my shields until they're gone. Is there any way to counter this?

Build faster ships. Concussion beams have long range and a good punch, but up close they can't match blasters rate of fire. So put more engines and turning jets on your ships so they can get up close and personal.

[currierm]

ORIGINAL: Foraven

Build faster ships. Concussion beams have long range and a good punch, but up close they can't match blasters rate of fire. So put more engines and turning jets on your ships so they can get up close and personal.

One clarification- this is two months into the first year of the game with the most basic start tech. I imagine it will be years before I get concussion beams and I'm not sure I have the cashflow or tech to build fast ships yet. It just seems odd the pirates would start out that far ahead. I did use the auto-generate setting for the AI players. When you use this, can they start with dramatically better tech? Haven't observed this in other games, but I've only played a few.

[Foraven]

ORIGINAL: currierm
One clarification- this is two months into the first year of the game with the most basic start tech. I imagine it will be years before I get concussion beams and I'm not sure I have the cashflow or tech to build fast ships yet. It just seems odd the pirates would start out that far ahead. I did use the auto-generate setting for the AI players. When you use this, can they start with dramatically better tech? Haven't observed this in other games, but I've only played a few.

Nothing prevent you from redesigning your ships, it's not that expensive. One level of weapon (or any other tech) isn't that far ahead, you can catch that back easily if you trade techs with other empires. Now, you should check out what setting you have when you start the game. If you are not careful some empire could get generated with many colonies and/or vastly superior techs (more than one level ahead), the kind of gap you can never bridge.

[torrenal]

One of the very first items I crash research is torpedoes, for the explicit purpose of getting that long arm to swat things with.

Barring longer range, you need ships that are faster than your opponents, or in numbers that are prohibitive, or (better still), repair a few abandoned ships -> problem solved.
//Torrenal

[currierm]

Thanks for the tips.

ORIGINAL: torrenal
One of the very first items I crash research is torpedoes, for the explicit purpose of getting that long arm to swat things with.

Barring longer range, you need ships that are faster than your opponents, or in numbers that are prohibitive, or (better still), repair a few abandoned ships -> problem solved.
//Torrenal

Do you crash research much? Haven't tried it yet. Seems too expensive to use commonly, but maybe certain situations call for it?

[WoodMan]

Depending on what Research speed you chose at the game start crash researching has varying degrees of importance.  I use very slow, and it takes a very long time to research anything at all without crashing it.  I usually wait until the tech is over halfway researched, about 3/4 complete and then crash it. 

I used to crash Construction Yard every single game as soon as I could afford it, but since they thankfully upped the sizes that the basic construction yard can build there is no longer a need [:D]

[torrenal]

I usually play with the slowest setting for tech, on 1000+ star galaxies.

If I don't crash research it, it doesn't really seem to get anywhere.  Besides, I generally want a few select items in the early game (torpedoes rank #1 or 2 on that list).
//Torrenal