Do pirates steal or capture military units?

[Siddham]

I was going through my list of military units and noticed some were on named ships I did not recognize; and when I went to the unit it was usually to a remote area of space or a planet I had no visibility of.
I was puzzled by this; and checked up on them now and again trying to figure out what was going on
Then lo & behold one of these unit showed up in one of my systems....on a pirate ship!
Do pirates steal or capture or enlist or whatever military units?
Or can military units on a colony with a pirate base defect?
Or maybe pirates can recruit units on your colony if they have a base?
(I mean a pirate bunker thing)
I dont know. Anyone any insight on this?

[Bingeling]

I guess you see the results of boarding and capture.
If you look in the empire options, you should find some settings for what to do when capturing (enlist, retire...).

Pirates build ships at their spaceports, not anywhere else as far as I know.

[Siddham]

No I dont think it has anything to do with that. The pirates did not board any of my ships.
I am not at war with any of the pirates, yet. Paying them off for now; biding my time.
They can only have got the units from one of my colonies. At least I cannot see how else they got them.
Some of the pirates build facilities on my colonies. I let them build them because I use them to train my troops and generals.

[ElanaAhova_slith]

Never saw pirates stealing - perhaps its a spy mission? Comment: Also, IF you kill a pirate base, sometimes, some pirate ships 'join' your faction. Be aware that the Guardians will still fire on these ships.

[Siddham]

Just to update more odd behavior related to this issue of my units turning up on pirate ships.
Even though they are on a pirate ship they are considered mine by the game and on my list of troops.
And if the pirate uses them to raid a planet and succeeds I get a notification that I have successfully invaded and taken over the planet!

So I think it must be a bug

(I am using Icemania's Extended AI Mod)

[Shogouki]

That definitely sounds like a bug. Is Icemania's Extended AI Mod the only mod you have installed?

[Siddham]

ORIGINAL: Shogouki

That definitely sounds like a bug. Is Icemania's Extended AI Mod the only mod you have installed?

I was also using Astradeus Characters and a couple of other minor cosmetic additions such as reduced Db sun sounds and different UI sound effects and Sea of Stars Private Ship Symbols. I think that's all.
I dont have the game any longer. I reinstalled and started over. Was quite early in the game which is why the pirates were so prominent. The faction in question had a base in one of my systems and I was paying them a very small fee; so we were getting along well. I figures at first they were perhaps able to enlist units from my planet and I thought that was cool. But when their raids were being reported as successful or failed invasions for my Empire I figured something was amiss; so I decided to start over. Shame there are not more people playing these days - or that I am so late to the party. I have not been able to find any mention of this issue anywhere else.