Yeah I agree, don’t mine in systems that have an active Pirate Stronghold (FOB), Triglavian Invasion, Sansha Incursion and Emerging Conduit Anomaly sites.
As for the NPC Mining Fleets, besides then quickly clearing out all the belts in system, attacking them will give negative standing hits and eventually they end up spawning Attack Fleets right after players land on grid. Anyway, an easy way to avoid all that hassle is just mine Ore Anomaly sites.
Career Agents and Skill Queue has been around for a long time, however only Omega accounts have access to the unlimited skill training time option. Skill Injectors cost money / ISK which is something that new players have in short supple due to constantly buying skills and equipment needed to advance.
In my opinion the Agency is only good for intel on where the FOB’s, Invasions and Incursions are located. It also shows where Emerging Conduits are but is limited to within 2 jumps from current location.
Removing standings to anchor a structure in High Sec was a bad game change in my opinion, even though getting a structure anchored in High Sec was easily done back then so the removal of that isn’t that big of a change.
Disposable Alpha Clones? I think the EULA states that isn’t allowed. Hopefully if or when it happens, CCP still enforces it and takes appropriate action.
In the past Gun Mining was a big deal. Rogue Drones dropped lot’s of Alloys and Compounds which reprocessed into Minerals. Also NPC’s dropped a lot more loot which reprocessed into Minerals.
Anyway, in my opinion new players could easily access more resources in the past compared to now. Simply because there wasn’t a bunch of advanced NPC’s spawning in High Sec systems.