SPRT Space Pirates
The SPRT Space Pirates were the first faction introduced to the game, depending on how you look at it.
SPRT Space Pirates
The Space Pirates are a hostile NPC Faction of pirates that harass the Engineer relentlessly. Their aim and purpose is unknown, but what is known is that they desire the destruction of anything the Engineer produces.
The SPRT Founder is simply credited as "Space Pirates". SPRT's color scheme seems to vary between bright red, obsidian black, dark grey, and light grey.
The pirate's faction tag is SPRT, but their victims often misread and report it as SPAT, either due to panic or due to the suboptimal HUD font.
Gallery
SPRT faction pirate drone Stinging Adversary attacking
An unarmed SPRT trade station
SPRT faction pirate base
SPRT faction pirate drone Fleeting Rival approaching a player base
Default Pirate Encounters
Among the Original Content games, the named planet starts (Earth Planet, Mars Planet, Moon Base) come with pirate bases on planets and in space.
Occasionally, the Engineer discovers a pirate base, which defends itself with drones from a distance when the player enters a certain range. Drones are their favorite method of attack against the Space Engineer. The drones have names such as Fleeting Rival, Drifting Pursuant, Stinging Adversary, or Spiteful Aggressor. Most of the pirate vessels seem to be en-route to an unknown destination set past the boundaries of the map.
Pirate Trading Outpost
If Economy is enabled, it is possible to encounter a rare pirate-owned trade station, you recognise it by its safe zone. They sell the same components as traders.
Even if your reputation with the pirates is hostile (red HUD signal), the trade station is not armed, so you can approach and enter unchallenged, but since trade stations do not do business with hostiles, it is possible that you cannot actually trade there.
If you have attacked other faction's cargo ships, your repuation with other factions decreases and your reputation with SPRT improves. As soon as you lose your ability to do business with other trade stations, the pirate trade stations will start doing business with you.
Which Maps Contain Pirates?
Note: There are no pirate bases in the "Star System" Sandbox Game on PC (on Xbox, this corresponds to “Home System”/“Alien System”/“Distant Moons”). The “SPRT Mayday” signals encountered there are owned by the same pirate faction, but are part of the Random Encounters world setting.
How to trigger Pirate Encounters on any map?
Do you need a worthy opponent to test your battle skills against? You can replicate pirate base behaviour in a location of your choice and challenge their drones. See How to trigger Pirate Encounters on any map.