I think it was somebody else, but hey. What matters is that it's finally there.
What I see as great is that the "scanning range" value on scanners actually matters now - you can select the NPCs visually by clicking on the ship in space if it is big enough for you to see it, up to the new distance limit. But they will not show on your contact list if they are beyond your scanner's range. Which is why some folks were talking about 4K, I imagine. The distance at which NPCs spawn remains unaltered - they will still appear at 2.5K and try to ambushCD.
What's better and worse at the same time, is that once you spot them they won't go away until you're (the new distance) away from them.
This also affects Nova torps - before this change, fired tracking ammo would disappear the same way as NPCs if no player was within 2.5K - meaning that you can bombard stations and weapon platforms and even stationary battleships from outside their gun range.
If you try a Nova on a weapons platform on another server, fire it from 3K and stay at 3K from the platform, the target will not take damage because the torp is discarded before it gets there.
It is entirely possible that the change will increase server load in situations with many missiles, NPCs and players. How much, that is the question.
