And Siege Cannons are bad? They're one of the easiest npc's out there.

"Ugly" NPCs are more annoying than difficult. I plan on adding more NPC's in the future to make the list more comprehensive.

dont forget the lovely octafari leviathan and the wonderful dark iso runner... both have tons of def since their rank matched. even debuffed the iso runner takes 50-80 energy for me.

Excellent so far. Flamehawks are now the bane of my existence. At least assassins mean I can get better guns or planet artis.

Awesome info blue. The inner workings of Autoranking on NPCs is very intriguing to someone like me, I've seriously considered trying, however I have been doing the exact opposite of late. I thought slow rank grinding was the best way to become powerful. There is no way I will catch the players that started a year ahead of me so I've always thought as long as my ship is better than those my rank I'm doing good. Am I wrong? I would like to hear your opinion on slow vs. auto/fast ranking in an upcoming issue!

I'm not Bluecifer but I'll give you my insights.
If you auto-rank you will get more planet slots = more planets = more resources = more powerful ship. So if you auto-rank you will get a lot more powerful a lot quicker, but you will have a weak ship. Why is this? Because the other people at the same level as you will be more powerful than you, because you ranked up too quickly and your resources haven't caught up. And that's where slow-ranking comes in, it doesn't let you get insanely powerful, and pretty quickly most people just leave you behind, yet you have a strong ship. Why is this? Again because of the other people your rank, you will have accumulated resources for much longer than them so of course your ship is going to be much tougher in most cases. In the end it all comes down to your strength compared to the relative strength of those around you.

Player A ranks slowly. They become more powerful than the people around them, but people much higher ranked become even more powerful, because they have a lot more resources and planets (plus, NPCing allows them to make better planets).

Player B auto-ranks. The jump up a few hundred ranks. Their ship is weaker than other people's, because they have been there for longer. However, with more planet slots and planet upgrades, they can son out-grow lower-ranked players, including Player A.

In the end, it depends on which you prefer. I tend to go the auto-ranking method, wit the occasional freeze (not ranking at all) to stop myself becoming a tin-can. For more in-depth explanations, I point you towards PhantasyStar / StrmAvenger for slow-ranking, or Bobdebower / Tree7304 for auto-ranking.

Me, I also like to ask myself - what is more fun? Staring at a screen watching grass grow, or slaughtering vast hordes of NPCs and taking their loot?

Staring at a screen watching grass grow, killing NPCs and taking their loot is just plain tedious.

PvP is alot more fun pre-trapfest.

I'm starting a freeze tomorrow. (Screw reaching 250!)

See, the thing about slow/freeze ranking is it takes little to no effort. Just time. You end up underestimated by other players. At 209, I often kill 400s for kicks. I do not use debuffs, and I rarely repair. THAT is what is fun. Shooting NPCs is like shooting fish in a barrel which have been chained together and had their throats slit. It's not really all that fun.

I agree, I recently npc'd for 50 ranks straight, got bored enough that I was barely logging into the game.

It's all about balance. Npc a bit. Then switch to missions. Then pick a fight with someone 200 levels your senior. If you mix it up, then you'll rarely get bored. That said, I've found that npc'ing becomes more interesting if you don't focus on the killing. Instead you focus on the rewards so that mentally you only register something's happening if you get a toxic purifier, lazuli fabrication planet, etc. It makes it a lot easier to put up with the monotony focusing on the net positives. Nowadays I don't even notice I'm killing flamehawks. They're just something in the way of me finding a planet data optimizer.

Now, I personally LOVE all the npc's that you put in the BAD section. The more assassins the merrier for me, dark badges give you access to awesome stuff. Same goes for Siege Cannons, an easy takedown with the potential for not just rp but dark badge loving. Lastly, Stryll Trappers may seem tedious and what they drop may seem inconsequential... UNTIL you need to go on a pvp/raiding/hacking spree. When I was more junior I used to scrap the trap probes. Now I treasure them and hoard them jealously. Used appropriately they will provide a wonderful buffer for your null fuses (which can disappear quickly when you get your action count up in to the hundreds).

Wow those NPC planets dan's working on are out already?

Oh shush. You know I didn't get any sleep last night.

NPC can be very rewarding, but it can get expensive buyin' nanos and cages and you need good back-up from your legion or your BT can soon fill with elites and bosses.

I love Npc'ing, see i wanna get all the mods from the bosses and i am still needing 2 more ballistae and 2 more Comp rays and a scythe plating, but yeah especially when i was in Lords of Infinity a couple of days ago i'd found 5 T.O. Troop carriers in 2 days, had a ball there, tons of elites and bosses and i found a few blade harvesters and rogue labpods, u gain ctp pretty quick in a top legion. Stryll assassin's are always easy to kill as i'm always increasing my attack.

PVP is great coz u get to test out your ship against other players (if this fight arena or whatever gets implemented, then will be a better and fun way of testing out your ship against others), i like challenges when pvp'ing i've found some tough ships, haven't managed to disable The Black Pearl yet next time i see him i will . Sometimes i get bored of Pvp tho so i will kill the player who is highest rank in my BT, tho rank doesn't mean much.

Overall i think they are both great as long as u mix em up a bit like some have said.

Buying Nanos and cages?

How is that a facepalm? They're some of the most sought after artis out there.