The idea of stationary automated turrets that you can barely see from a distance, as they're so tiny, that can produce god-like amounts of damage placed on borders in space does not necessarily make sense. Directly outside of stations, yes, but not so far from home. Anyways, I don't think I'm alone when I suggest that replacing the turrets with an epic capital ship blockade with fighters and really really fast interceptors (furies?) in-between would be pretty damn cool.

I'd like to see the turrets' capabilities replaced with a stationary HAC, for the sort of immersion reasons you mention. However, without the God-like weapons currently deployed, the "blockade" would be entirely ineffective.

As it stands now, breaking through one ring of turrets is child's play; two rings gets tricker, but once you know how to influence your jump characteristics, it becomes far less "random" as to whether you live or die upon exit into the inner ring of turrets. All of which is to say that even the uber turrets don't really slow down an X1/Hound/Hog II piloted by one of us intent of doing a capital systems noob hunting tour.

I didn't necessarily say to nerf the blockades, though, my mention about God-like powers was in relation to the fact that the turrets are so tiny you can't see them from a distance. So I fully agree with you. I would say to have some HACs with longer range Gauss turrets on em (just like the turrets) then turn Tridents into missile cruisers that fire the instant-kill missiles. I don't necessarily know how adding interceptors like furies would affect the blockade, but it would probably make it more interesting and add some extra immersion.

I promise you that the Devs have other plans for furies. And I don't think we want to clutter up WHs too much with caps, so the fewer that can provide the same coverage as turrets, the better.

NPC enemies can run a turret blockade no problem

in mission 3 of a set I have in jallik/edras 3 serco SVG's can chase down a moth right to the WH