Orion ships are designed to avoid detection, being basically flat with angled hull plates to scatter any scanner beam that touches them. Most of the independent ship captains operating piracy franchises used light raiders or raider cruisers the cartel itself maintained heavy cruisers which it used as enforcers to deal with those who poached without a franchise or failed to pay their franchise fees. Each of these minor pirates was supported by the cartel network which bought stolen or smuggled goods, repaired damaged ships, bought and sold captured freighters, and traded in intelligence information on shipping schedules and police patrols. One pirate might lease an area in which he had the sole right to attack merchant ships, while another pirate might get the franchise for all smuggling into and out of the Rigelian system. A crimelord led each cartel, and leased parts of his area to individual pirates as franchises for various criminal operations. The territory of the Federation, Klingons, Romulans, Gorns, Kzintis, Lyrans, and Hydrans was overlayed by a network of fiercely independent criminal cartels. Pirate organizations based on Orion took advantage of this, becoming the headquarters of a far-reaching criminal operation including piracy, smuggling, and creating illegal mining colonies on unclaimed planets. Among other things, this meant that the Orions (not the Federation) enforced Federation law inside Orion space. Because the Federation needed Orion technology, ships, and shipyards, the Federation made a deal that gave the Orion province special autonomy. Orion originally joined the Federation as an ally during the First Romulan War. The Pirates of Orion cover the entire Alpha Octant, but by the time of the General War, few of them were actually Orions.

Star trek orion pirates ship models