oh snap just had a great idea that came form a legion mate stupid comments in a conversation we were having about tactical officers and mine traps.

new defensive trap to combat raids, an anti-gravity proximity mines. chance to set off a mine that blows up raiding crewmembers.

How bout NO untill we get a buff for raiding .
like NERVE GAS or bio electric shock grenades

Either way, I don't think it should actually kill the crew. Either it would kill so few that it wouldn't actually help keep you safe, but would be fairly bothersome to the raider, or it would kill enough to really lower their chance at successful invasion, but it would pretty devastating to them (taking off at least a few levels worth of crew). It would need to stop them by some other means.

that's the point to kill the attackers crew a risk you accept by raiding the player. every hostile action you take should have equal reactions to your crew as well.

I know that's the point; that's why I didn't like it. Killing a few of their crew won't help at all, and killing a lot of their crew is too much. One raid doesn't deserve losing 100+ crew.

exactly. you can already have crew die on you if you critically fail a raid (i know ive had it happen to me) so, actually your idea is already in place. unless rescued prisoners can be regularly obtained from raiding, losing crew at such a high rate would be too devistating to the game.

How about a new artifact trap that makes converts, making the raiding crew change sides joining your crew..
only like 10 at a time not 100, that is way too much, or have a differential to rank, like if a high rank fails (or critical fail) against a lower rank ( or much lower rank) the #converted is amplified..

while this isnt a big deal for anyone over rank 180, to low levels crew and rank points are the most valuable resource in the game.

-1 to any crew killing/transfering ideas.

Um, I don't really see the point of this. You might as well remove raiding from the game. It's not like you get much from raiding anyway, so why would anyone raid if there is a good chance to lose a lot of crew members.

didnt intend it to work against the lower ranks, meant it to work against the higher rank raider..

and it doesnt have to be a large turnover, how about it only be between 1 and 10 possible to defect to the raided ship.
and maybe make it more rare as you rank higher, making it more common for lower ranks, and it would also have no effect on a lower rank (or very lower rank) that raids a higher rank.

and maybe raiding should improved.. either way it would ward off any enemy that is higher ranked than you.

Here is an idea: successful raids cause "missing crew" penalties to an opponent's raided ship, and creates a "prisoner count" for your ship. successfully critical raiding a ship that has a prisoner count above 20 will reward rescued prisoners to the raider (and remove all the defender's prisoners) and restore up to 5 "missing crew" to your ship.

Effects:
prisoners- give no bonuses or penalties
missing crew- for every 4 missing crew the ship has -1 to research production, max energy, attack, and defense
these effects have no change to crew strength

With this, 4 new artifacts can be used:
prisoner exchange contract- lowers your prisoner count by 10 and restores 10 missing crew (must have at least 10 prisoners)
mutiny bribe- inflicts 10 missing crew on target ship and gives them 5 prisoners
interrogation protocols- lowers your prisoner count by 20 and rewards rescued prisoners (must have at least 20 prisoners)
ensign recruits- restores 5 missing crew

Also, any number of new traps can effect missing crew and prisoners:
holographic prison trap- inflicts 5 missing crew on raiding ship and adds 5 prisoners to yours
interior detonation trap- inflicts 10 missing crew on raiding ship

interrogation protocols I think makes a good yellow badge reward and ensign recruits can be added to artifact draws.
And I just noticed something, we could implement "missing crew" penalties as an alternative to crew death.

a trap that limit the attackers crew attack like a bio-weapon that hospitalizes them would be great don't want random crew dying. but we really don't need more traps I'm thinking we should have secondary options on our current traps so if you have the traps you can have both a offensive or defense option on them.
examples
omicron mine option 1 space normal 400 damage.
option 2 crew trap ( next raid 400 crew invading crew are hospitalized for 1 hour) only affects raids not other things the crew do.

Theataron mine option 1 space normal 2500 damage.
option 2 crew trap ( next raid 2500 crew invading crew are hospitalized for 1 hour) only affects raids not other things the crew do.

Halcyon Trap option 1 truces attacker for 1 hour
option 2 removes all negative artifacts on ship also puts up a dampening field that does not allow more artifacts to be placed (does not removed traps)

Krionus Virus Trap option 1 inflicts -90% to attack
option 2 increases defense by 90%

Quantum Firewall Trap option 1 attacking ship loses all cloak for 2 hours
option 2 defending ship gets double the scan defense (does not apply to anything but hacks.)

or just some thoughts