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Pirates of that age should not be confused with Privateers: the latter were legitimate privately-owned ships carrying 'Letters of Marque' that justified & legitimised their actions on behalf of their country's government (along with associated legitimate prize rewards awarded by said government) towards Hostile Powers designated by their Government; the former were purely freebooters, not generally associated with any government, country or any other power (although pirates sometimes offered their services as privateers in exchange for pardons + loot - : eg Edward Teach (Blackbeard) for example became the legitimate British Governor of Jamaica for a while).
By contrast modern (c20/21) 'pirates' usually ransom their prize (crew, passengers, ship, cargo) due to the logistics difficulty of keeping & utilising such a prize for themselves, plus modern communications & surveilance advantagessurveillance advantages make holding onto a sizeable ship difficult..
In X:R we can currently ignore crew, passengers & morale, so it's up to <player> to prioritise cash, cargo or hulls as they see fit..
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External: The Trojan (hacker) drone can disable shields, engines or turrets, or cause the ship to drop cargo depending upon which hack points you successfully complete. If used /prior/ to Yisha's boarding demands it will take at least 4 or 5 successes to hack <target> (Yisha only requires 1 success per demand). I find the minigame difficult & irritating so I don't generally bother, but others may have more success here..
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You'll want to intercept <target> & destroy their engines/Jump drive as quickly as possible while out of range of any hostile stations or patrol ships to avoid 'helpful' friendlies destroying your prize & boarding crew. The TO DLC adds a 'Constrictor missile' (only available from TO sectors' Arms Dealers) which disables boost for a time when (if) it hits.. Full full operational details for this missile are not currently available. Another method is to mine the engines with the Traitor drone, then remote-explode the mines when the ship moves to a convenient spot*..
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A Rahanas freighter is an easy boarding target on paper only. Its : its hull is so weak that a slight miscalculation or stray shot may destroy the ship with your marines onboard, & it has so few defences that its main asset other than its cargo (its it's drones) are at great risk of being lost to Yisha's boarding demands (destroy Drone Bay). If possible choose a Sanahar over a Rahanas: the hull is stronger, defences are better & (slightly) more numerous & its speed & maneuverability is much improved over the earlier model. Once you have the technique, it's just as easy to board despite the slightly increased BR <Sparky please link to boarding pages>
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*Probably its average value as defined in the Encyclopaedia, modified by <player's> rep with the shipyard, but there may be a discountloss; I haven't checked
Collector/Badass
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