This suggestion is fairly wordy I suppose, so I’ll hop right to it.
Transports should be easily identifiable by their escorts
-This would allow aggressive players to identify and evaluate if a target is worth attacking or not just by seeing what ships are defending the transport.
-Transports with common cargo should have the traditional 3 fighters (2 ion emitter and 1 railgun)
-Transports with fuel should have varying escorts, ranging from a composition of interceptors and fighters to frigates and destroyers since corporations that transport the fuel would be hiring mercenaries for help rather than employ escort ships.
-Transports with resources should always have a frigate in the escort composition with a mixture of other ships. This way it would be easy for aggressing players to confuse the fuel and resource transports (I know, this goes against the point of this part of the suggestion, but some confusion needs to be there).
-Transports with ship components should be guarded by heavily armed destroyers and should always to be a risk to aggress, although a victory should not be unrewarded.
Defending a transport should not be worthless
-As mentioned briefly in Lord_Xenon’s suggestion ( Call for support )there should be a be a benefit to defending a transport against attacking ships, including aggressing players. I suggest that a moderate reward that varies with transport type be implemented.
-If a transport is successfully defended a small amount of credits or an item similar to what would have dropped from the transport should it have been destroyed should be awarded to the player, although once defended they can no longer attack the transport or the remaining escort ships but instead receive rewards whenever the transport is successfully defended against attacks, potentially yielding more rewards than if the player were to aggress the transport.
Ships on hire for forward fleet missions should be encounterable in OS
-Ships that players have hired out to corporations for forward fleet missions that involve escorting a transport should be able to be met in OS although they should only be able to be destroyed if the mission has a high fail chance (>30%). This suggestion is simple so that forward fleet missions have more of a presence than a simple timer on the ships.
Faction transports (such as Federation merchants and Mendes transports) should be escorted by police units
-The only reason I’m mentioning this is simply because I personally find it aggravating that quest transports are usually poorly defended to begin with despite being of such a high status. The police or other corporate police really should be defending the transport alongside you if it is going through dangerous sectors. The transports themselves however should yield rare loot if a player is able to successfully defend/destroy the ship.
Any thoughts?