*Recruitment does not require influence.
*Recruitment is free of charge.
*Cannons are free of charge.
*Upkeep costs are halved
*+10% fame earned from plunder (ie if you earn 1000 fame, you earn a bonus of 10%, aka 100 fame more.)
Keeping in mind that pirates operate with very low ship numbers as the more ships you sail, the more you allow yourself to be vulnerable to retaliation and the like, these benefits are very negligible. Compared to reduced recruitment costs and ship repairs costs, a % increase in profit from selling resources, and a% gain on fame for Kings, the difference between the benefits is very astonishing.
When I am not flying a nation's flag, I get to save a couple thousand maximum for preparing my fleets, and my upkeep of <10,000 gold is halved?! AND I get to gain 2,200 fame per plunder victory and lose 200k per defeat as a consequence of the game's mechanics for fleet size as a pirate?! Wow, I sure have it nice!!! Especially compared to (insert player here) who gets to make extra tens/hundreds of thousands extra off of resource selling, cheaper ship upgrades and cannon costs, who is also eligible to receive payouts and stipends from their nation?
Why would anyone ever want to be something other than a pirate?!?!
My qualms are not even with the gold disparities, as it is just the difference in the two playstyles. Obviously it makes sense for merchants to be able to generate more and more gold as they grow larger and larger and move up the ranks of their nation. I do think, however, that pirates should get either tweaked benefits or completely overhauled benefits.
I do think that there should be some sort of benefit that merchants don't get their hands on in one way or another- pirates get free recruitment, but merchants still get reduced recruitment costs. Pirates get 10% plunder fame, merchants can climb to the top of their nation and get 1% total fame. Sure, the merchants costs are higher objectively to reach the benefits, but pirates forego those costs in exchange for less reliable income and no access to the NPC tax features of the game.
Any thoughts on something that wouldn't make piracy too strong, but incentivize it more? I am more looking for community ideas on things completely unique from what merchants are able to get a semblance of themselves- things related to plundering, a lower ship count, etc.
