You have basically defined 'pirate' with your claims on the outfall from Retribution.

Piracy in the real world is a criminal activity and these days is uncommon to be found in the truest sense of the word anywhere but poorer and deprived parts of the world where the law cannot be upheld to the standard it is in our countries.

Piracy is a lifestyle, and you do not need low-sec to operate from. If I were to be a pirate in Eve, I would be in the wormholes and deep 0.0 using spies to acquire ransom targets. There are no boundaries to what you can do and, in all fairness, I have never understood the methodology of hanging out in low-sec to pirate.

You might hang out in the popular low-sec areas to gang bang nerds that are passing through or to get PvP pn your doorstep, but that is not piracy.

I would say part of the issue is that now that more can fight back plus knowing to stay out of low/null you just fewer targets.
That and since we are past summer all the idiot noobs that alot of pirates depended on have left the game.
Really the issue is that most pirates are just gankers who dont want to lose ships.
There is no honorable pirate.
A pirate will always ransom and remain true.
The rest are just edgy hipster gankers who couldnt load a 5 pounder if their life depended on it.
(clear barrel>swab>powder>wad>ball>fuse>position>fire)
Really most of the gate camping gankers are what turn people off.
The ones who would be champions of Khorne for all their love of killing.

Nothing happened. There is nothing glamorous nor honorable about being a pirate. Pirating is an ugly profession that will never get any respect except from other pirates.

So what is the difference between a pirate and your regular run-of-the-mill low-sec pvper?

A pirate does it for the money, not just for fun?
A pirate always offers and honors ransoms?
???

I've done some low-sec pvp (and atoned for my sins by spending many hours ratting my sec status back up) but I never considered myself a pirate - just a pvper looking for some kills.

On the other hand I have met self-proclaimed "pirates" that spend all day running lvl4 missions in their low-sec home.

I find it hard to talk about piracy being boosted or nerfed when I have no idea how it is different from regular pvp...

Alright, let's be serious and look at this objectively for a moment.

Before Retribution was released, piracy was in decline. Understandably, some die-hards (myself included) don't want to admit any truth to this, and others attempt to address it by flaming and shooting down posts as care-bears and such. In truth, especially after Retribution, it really feels like our chosen profession is dying a slow and painful death.

Of course, there are hold-outs across EvE, but we are hardly in the days of avoiding every low-sec system possible for fear of losing our ships. Even now, many low-sec PvP organizations don't even bother brandishing the title of "pirate," as low-sec is infested with faction warfare and the like.

So simply, here's my question to the community, because I know some of us that wear the title proudly are still out there:

What happened?

Why does it almost feel like half of us are ashamed to call ourselves pirates anymore, and those of us that accept it, spend our days hiding in anonymity and seclusion? Retribution has given us a tool that could bring tons of flavor to being a pirate, if at a higher risk, so why does it feel that we're hiding from the spot-light?

In some ways, it nearly feels as if the pirate has become the care-bear. Many contacts of mine that wore -10.0 proudly have now cleaned up, claiming that "the risk of piracy is too great." Have we thus lost the war for low-sec?

Perhaps I'm being too analytical, but as I return to the game again, I find myself disappointed by the lack of honorable low-sec pirates. It's simply so much easier to make my way into 0.0 and fight petty Alliance wars. I once played this game to skirmish, steal, and live a life in the shadows, but it seems we've given up the shadows.

So, I ask, what do you think, and what should we do about it?

What are you smoking bro? Retribution has breathed new life into Piracy. If anything it's on the rise. Dunno about you but I've gotten more activity in the last three days than in the last three months. Looking at a little choke point 36 kills in under 24 hours.

Also take into account the craziness that is the Algos, Vexor, and Thorax. Our little suicide cruiser gang took our drakes, two Nightmares and a Talos and Hurricane. Make no mistake a lot of us wear the Flashy Red with pride.

So hoist the colors, mother fu*^ers. We're going in hot

As a pirate myself (I really have no other career in Eve), I don't think that piracy is tapering off any more than it was at the beginning of Inferno. The Retribution buffs have added some nice tools and beneficial mechanics for us lowsec pirates.

I have noticed a little more traffic into my home, from carebears looking for a pvpers fix, missioners/plexers and sometimes anti-pirates and other pirates alike. I think we'll see a slow rejuvenation of people returning back to lowsec piracy from highsec wars and general griefing due to more pilots venturing out of highsec to get a taste for the seedier parts of New Eden.

Ha!

Heh ha hee haw, tighten up your cowboy hat Hoss.

Maybe the lesser skilled outlaws and weekend warriors are afraid to wear the flashy red...but not the pirates I know, certainly not Amamake's finest.

Piracy in retribution is better than ever before, and with all these so called "bounty hunters" coming to low-sec...I just want to thank CCP for finally putting the rest of Eve in a position where they'er not afraid to fight us anymore.

Bounty me :)

**** no,

The new crimewatch is pretty much the best thing that has ever been introduced to the game for outlaws.

That along with my personal favorite, "c-key insta5-¦scan"



As to other points.. Ashamed for being an outlaw? You're hanging in the wrong circles mate..

Piracy is a state of mind not sec status.

Posting in a thread about how I don't exist anymore

apparently neither does my entire corp....

Until this post I did not know of you.
Perhaps you should stage some daring raids deep into hisec.