No NPC is as good or better than a player, that is why PvP > PvE in all cases.
Why? This is as anti EVE as you can get.
Why not both?
Players pay premium prices for faction ammo and mods. Implants and boosters.
There is no reason NOT to take them.
No it’s not.
The vast VAST majority of haulers make their journey without issue.
As a reference, a couple years ago (2016 i think) red frog had a 99.9% success rate.
You either don’t know or are being disingenuous.
Literally mentioned in OP.
Competent? Non-specific term.
If i could tackle a wartarget in faction warfare in my t1 frigate on a gate today, i probably couldn’t if the guy has bought a bunch of mercs.
No matter how much you try to downplay this suggestion, the very purpose of this feature is to change the game so attacking someone is harder.
If anything, lets have a productive discussion. So don’t lie.
You haven’t been reading then.
Your definition of social interaction is narrow or primitive.
Adding NPCs to alleviate the ‘lack of players’ is a misleaded concept. And ‘lack of players’ is a relative factor vs time zones, and game play style. Though now and then, one will come across lines whereby a money making entity, will be wishing for more customers - and take it as a huge revelation. It’s not. Eve online has always had its ups and downs over the years, and it being a tough game to begin with, and scoped towards the niche-scifi-market, the numbers will always ‘feel’ low. Moreover, the concept of replacing the ‘human factor’ (of actual existing player-base mercs) with NPCs, will encourage for massive exodus, and be more detrimental us all, than being a ‘solution’.
No they’re not better than players, they’re easier to get than players, and can be used in addition to players. Small difference.
Using NPCs is going to be the better choice for anyone who is too lazy to get players to help him. And on top of that, even if he already has players to help him, who’s going to say no to extra DPS? These NPCs are going to be a pretty much mandatory choice.
ISK sinks aren’t bad. But don’t start creating ISK sinks for the sake of ISK sinks. I can think of a lot of ISK sinks that would be ridiculous to implement (everyone loses 1m ISK each time they jump a gate) and no amount of ‘Why is another isk sink bad?’-questions could make it a good idea.
Providing more ships for PvPers to fight is a bad idea if these ships are found at every ship. Drones are similar to that, but drones have been balanced around each ship. Big ships get big drones, small ships get small drones. Some ships get drone damage bonus, other ships get other bonuses.
These mercenaries however will add a baseline damage / healing / hauling to every ship. Suddenly ships aren’t specialised anymore, but they can all do everything a bit, with the help of NPC mercenaries.
Also I don’t see why you ask if it’s bad for PvPers to have more ships to shoot. These ships aren’t PVP ships, they make every PvP engagement half a PvE engagement.
If people want help, they can ask around in local or in their corporation. Player interaction, that breathes life into the gameplay of newbies, not NPC ‘interactions’.
If you still have the energy, perhaps a short summary (just a list of one-liners, not the “why”) of the limitations, and if it’s possible, of some representative scenarios where NPC Mercs would be appropriate and useful (also one-liners).
Keep it in a file, and paste in that latest version every 10-20 “randomly destructive” posts.
Even the most constructive person isn’t going to read 200+ posts.
Cherry-pickers, well-poisoners, reactionaries, etc stop at the first thing they imagine they can base an effective attack on. So the flaky posts won’t stop as long as the topic is active: OTOH it’s got a lot of good content already - no need to repeat the motivation for the idea or the adjustments and improvements it’s gathered along the way.
PS: Not sure it’s been introduced yet, and I canned the post I was going to use:
There’s no practical difference in effectiveness between a low-level player hiring some Mercs, and a rich, higher-SP player in a ship that costs a hundred times as much. And the merc-hiring player has to pay for the privilege.
With appropriate limits to make sure they’e not easily abused, there’s nothing “unfair” about NPC Mercs. Using ISK to gain an advantage is standard EVE-style play (just look what you pay for the best equipment vs the next-best ones). I bet every one of the “EVE reactionaries” do it all the time 
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Red Frog are not the only people who haul, they are only some of the most experienced meaning they are well aware of all of the ways to mitigate the risk factors involved. Most dedicated Red Frog haulers fly routes with alts in triple webbed hyenas so their freighters are aligned and in warp before they can even be bumped. In that scenario npc mercs would be a waste of isk and ignored.
Red frog is basically an agency that connects the public with independent contractors. The red frog haulers are people like you, me and every other hauler.
But you’ve got nothing that would suggest that hiring npc haulers will be particularly vulnerable. And the idea at present was this:
Because then you have a situation where the player can choose to throw money at npc assistance, or the players that provide the service have to provide a better option than some AI pilots. Clone soldiers or something.
Isk sink + incentive.
Oh and hauler npcs would use autopilot for their ships, greatly increasing the risk involved in having them move items. You’re either not reading or just don’t want npc allies period, or both.
I’ve already provided multiple reasons why the addition could be good for the game, trying to shoot those ideas down and any others isn’t productive.
Regardless, everyone uses drones and drones die in droves. Adding npc allied ships means killmails for those hunting, and slightly better security for those using them for defense. Plus it would be an isk and resource sink, and would make roaming more rewarding since it puts more stuff in space. There’s loads of other bonus’, but it wouldn’t be fair to completely shoot down the “No npc mercs in my eve!” argument, because that shuts down discussion?
Same problem if the dude had player mercs assisting him.
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Or worse fly in front of the freighter, bumping it 
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You haven’t provided one reason nor one good idea. Bad ideas shouldn’t be implemented, so shooting them down is a duty.
You’re tripping over your own arguments at this point.
I’m not arguing against this idea as much as telling you why it’s not going to happen.
/Thread
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We all have to do our part! 
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For anyone reading this thread for the first time, here’s the lowdown:
A player can hire an NPC mercenary to defend him/her.
Here are the limitations:
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A mercenary will only defend (player’s ship must be targeted and attacked first for his mercenary to respond).
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There are 5 levels to the mercenary (frigate, destroyer, cruiser, battlecruiser, battleship), both t1 and t2. A t2 Mercenary is EXTREMELY expensive, as the defence they provide will be equivalent to a highly skilled pilot.
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Mercenary will only be activated (appear in space) when player’s ship is attacked in a ‘Vulnerable Zone’. This means the mercenary does not travel alongside your ship or enter warp with you.. It will only spawn once it is activated by the vulnerability alarm.
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Vulnerability Zone = ALL lowsec & highsec
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Vulnerability Alarm = activated if your merc is in ‘Defence Mode’. This alarm signals to the mercenary soldier that you have been attacked/are under threat, and need assistance. Once the mercenary has been signalled, his ship will spawn instantly beside yours. An alarm cannot be activated unless your ship has first been attacked/is under threat by another player. This makes abuse of the mercenary system impossible for players who want to use them against others as part of standard pvp engagements. [changes to come here]
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Time Limit of mercenary engagement: ALL mercenaries have a maximum time limit of 60 seconds during which they will engage (if activated) the attacking player. The time increases to 80, then 100 seconds on max skilling. When the time runs out the mercenary will de-spawn. The de-spawn takes place whether your ship is destroyed or not.
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If your ship is destroyed by an attacking player before the mercenary is destroyed, the mercenary ship will continue the attack until the Time Limit runs out.
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CONCORD will NOT respond to player threats involving mercenaries.
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Mercenaries will need skill training and isk to use.
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Mercenaries will NOT spawn outside of highsec or lowsec. (will not work in null or wormhole space).
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Other players will not know whether another player has mercenary protection. They cannot see your mercenary unless it is active.
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Mercenaries cannot be activated if you are in a fleet or in a corporation. They are meant for solo players’ defence.
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Mercenaries can be used for PvE in Vulnerable Zone (all of highsec and lowsec).
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Mercenaries can be used in FW - but their mechanic will be different: Players in faction warfare will have the opportunity to use their mercenaries in ‘Offense Mode’, whereas players outside FW can only use mercenaries in ‘Defence Mode’. FW mercenaries will offer valuable loot if destroyed.
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A player who uses a mercenary who is a member of FW must be the aggressor or defender against another FW ship in order for his/their mercs to spawn loot if either are destroyed.
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Non-FW mercs do not give loot once destroyed.
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Any player using a merc gets his bounty transferred to the merc. If his merc gets destroyed by another player, the bounty gets transferred to that player.
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As well as NPC mercs, players can also hire NPC Transporters. The NPC Transporters will provide extra ‘cargo’ space for haulers, miners (ore space to store more rocks). The bonus of the NPC Transporter’s cargo however will not be equal or near the Freighter. The NPC Transporters cargo bonus will be between 5,000m3 and 35,000m3 depending on your skill level. The purpose of this is to help solo players and new players in the mining field and with transporting goods between locations.
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Players can also hire NPC miners ~ this is an idea in development, but I may withdraw it if nobody likes it or thinks i’m doing too much.
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Alphas cannot use NPS assistance of any kind.
Meh… there’s already Mercenaries in game, and run by players. Other than to avoid space conflict (which is the core of the game), I see no point of Npc Mercs. Plus implmenting this alternative will cut down business for our player mercenaries, and most likely have them leave the game. So I do not support this idea. 
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Aren’t play mercs used mostly in corporation or alliance warfare though?
No, that is no longer even allowed.
Since when?
Well not really. It’s just that the late Wardec nerf is detrimental to them (I suppose), so they are losing some space-business. I think solo player can rent their services as well - or probably, since the Wardec update, they will look into the solo-player market more than before.
More on war dec updates here (and related devblog): https://www.eveonline.com/article/pnlesq/war-war-sometimes-changes
Bwahahaha… invisible insta spawn NPCs.
Seriously, if you have to have a huge list of rules on who can and cant use, situations where they can and cant be used, then really its not a great upgrade for the game.
It really boils down to you wanting extra protection from PvPers and jerry rigging some convoluted idea with rules so that it benefits just your play style and denies it to anyone else.
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Almost every possible change to EVE needs a list of limitations, because most of EVE is competitive, and players are continually looking for ways to optimize their use of and/or abuse game features.
It’s not reasonable to criticize someone for being realistic, nor a suggestion because it can’t be fully described in one line.
For example “Lets make it possible for new-player Corps in highSec to be able to avoid harassment warDecs” sounds a lot simpler than it turned out to be
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