This is mostly just a thread for ruminating on some ideas for new NPC's that could provide a more detailed, immersive environment for players. I'm in no way suggesting anything here as a top priority, in fact, I'm going to lead off with something that will likely never be implemented. Call it dreaming.

Roid movers

I think it would be neat if the universe was populated with more utilitarian type NPC's. I would imagine nation space would be littered with grinder type NPC's, cleaning, moving, etc.

Given that asteroids collect near jump points, I propose it would be in the interest of local municipalities to keep these areas clear of asteroids in order to streamline trade and transport of goods.

These would be a nation-space only NPC's, although perhaps they would be seen around station sectors as well clearing asteroids away from the stations. I'm imagining little bots that looks somewhat like Mauds, with pushers protruding from the front of the cabin.

Anyway, I'm well aware of the scope of this suggestion, as I said, this is more a thread simply for imagining cool stuff.

Automated Space Dust Vacuum Cleaners

What it says on the tin.

Does that come with a true Hepa filter, or just a Hepa-type?

They use electrostatic charge to draw in the space dust particles. There is no medium involved. They're vacuum cleaners in the literal meaning of the word.

Instead of just convoys independent traders in Taurs, Atlas and Moths

i want a bot that goes around with a SHAMWOW saying "YOUR GONNA LOVE MY NUTS"

-regular data courier services
-regular hauler services (=RR's indie traders)
-Military / Police convoys
-BORDER patrol
-Customs agents / traffic control
-Space docks bot operated

-Hireable bots / bot service:
--Miner
--Escort
--Hauler
--Repair
and why not, for rats
--Pirate Bot

The hirable ones should be PURCHASED and will do very basic orders, and hauler/rat should remain working even after its owner logged off. All must be tagged with owner name. Owner should be informed of kills on monitored space. Limited number of active bots per player.

More daring:
-Corp's Connies operating as mining advanced centers, near rich fields

There used to be pirate bots. R.I.P. unrats. Q_Q

Yes for bringing back unrats, yes for having military/strike force convoys in nation space rather than the strike force automatically showing up (I had a suggestion thread for ideas regarding that), yes to the occasional individual traders in lone atlases or some such, and there definitely need to be more random patrols and such to threaten convoys. I.E. Valent and Axia mercenary squadrons patrolling grey space attacking any passing hive patrols or axia/valent patrols or convoys. Oh yeah, and we need to see more hive sneaking around the whs.

And the most daring yet: Monster-Bots that are crated on closets to operated very basic candies.

Pirate bots are good. Hire-able pirate bots are a stupid idea.

Change the word "pirate" for "mercenary" and it's a good idea. Not a new idea, but a good one none-the-less. Although I don't know how I feel about the whole idea of bots working for you after you log off.

And Tosh, I was joking. But thanks for the explanation. :P

Also: +1 and change to independent NPC traders.

I don't think I like the idea of hire-able anything. That discourages direct player interaction, which is the only thing that makes this game remotely fun. Hiring NPC's to shoot people for you is especially bad.

Matter of opinion I guess. The Devs have stated their wish to implement player run and controlled convoys, so in a way, this is sort of just the flip-side to that mechanic.

In terms of adding some life to the universe, having NPCs do pretty much everything players do would be interesting. NPCs mining asteroids around stations, for example, might make a "mining station" actually look like a mining station. Military patrols spawning from "barracks" stations would be interesting. A constant shuffle of trader NPCs bouncing around "commercial stations". Capitol stations should be hotbeds of all activity.

I wonder how many bots the servers can handle, and where we are in relation to that cap now. Creating swarms of activity might not be possible logistically. But I think all the behaviors I just mentioned already exist in the game - they just don't happen very often, or only happen in specific circumstances (ie suicide centaurs mining in hive missions). Having them happen all the time at random would go a long way towards making the game universe seem more alive.

One thing that would be cool and unnecessary would be to have a Trident or a HC warp in if you are detected and sufficiently hated wherever you are. I can imagine a KOS Serco running a wormhole in Itani space, a QRF HC warping in and dumping off the strike force, which then proceeds to chase you around. Each nation system should have one or two QRFs waiting around to protect the populace and harass enemies. I think this is what you meant when you said "military convoys" shank, but I missed the previous thread. Apologies if this is exactly what you already thought of.

Gotta agree with Starfucker here; one quick and easy would be to drop the mining taurs from hive skirmish into all mining stations. Another would be a constantly active SF that acts like station guards do at (1) all border stations, and (2) all barracks stations. Capitals already have marshalls and turrets, so I don't think they need a CAP as much.

The cap ship stuff is pretty stupid, however. Nobody's dispatching a Trident or HAC class ship to deal with the sort of incursions that happen constantly across all borders. And (I think) it would be far harder to implement. It would be nice to see an Itani version of the SMV Nemesis & Co. on patrol from, say, Itan to Deneb O-3.

There's plenty of other stuff that needs to be done with NPCs, but those two should be fast, easy, and not require much thought from a "how might this cause game mechanics problems" perspective.

Heh, hence the qualifier "unnecessary". It would make more sense to have a capital ship respond to an incursion if the player was flying a capital ship themselves, or if the incursion consisted of enough players to actually threaten the sector defenses, but for an individual, yeah, it would be excessive and nonsensical.