Elite is a game about flying a space ship. Basic and simply. Is about piloting your ship, going from point A to a point B or back to B. The origin/destination points are irrelevant to this premise, and so are the motives to do so. You play the game by flying your ship, and by definition you start in the cockpit of one. So much so, that at least to the date, you can't play outside your cockpit, and any future features promising otherwise are more like add-ons, extra features, and not the main, fundamental mechanics of the game.
What is extremely fundamental, however, in this mechanics, are the principles of transportation: distance and speed. Because flying depends on those two variables, there is a myriad of things in-game to reduce distance by adding speed in the form of better jump range in your FSD and all the set ups that this entails.
Those two variables in combination translate to time spend to complete a trip.
And make no mistake about it: from loading your cargo hold, to repairs, to combat, to smuggling, to exploration, EVERY SINGLE ACTIVITY IN THE GAME IS GEARED, JUSTIFIED AND GAUGED AROUND HOW FAR AND HOW QUICK YOU CAN FLY YOUR SHIP. The catalyst of this equation are the credits available to do so.
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For the sake of keeping distance, speed, and time in an equation that makes sense within the already futuristic -if not implausible- universe, super cruise speed was designed: it is an elegant solution to the mind blogging huge distances in space; a mechanic that allows to have a sense of scale of it all, but more importantly, it is designed for you to fly your ship through space. It is, by that, justified as serving the main purpose of the game.
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Transferring a ship from point A to point B, is not about you flying the ship. If anything is preventing you from doing so. However, it stands to reason that the laws of time, speed and distance, must be followed, if anything, to keep the ultimate and core concept of the game still true to itself: nothing in this universe -as it is right now- is able to travel instantaneously from one point to the other, and that's the very reason why you fly a ship, because there is the need for pilots, because there is a need for transportation.
Allowing that to exists, constitutes a slap to a basic and deep sense of justification for me to fly my ship, conceding that within the realm of this galaxy there are ways for you to travel instantaneously "we just want you to waste time and take the long way of travelling."
Under that premise, we won't see heavy combat ships struggling jumping system to system to reach a distant war anymore. In fact, the space will be filled with Asps, and Hauler, just because is so much faster to get there and then instantaneously summon your ship.
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On the same token, the process should take a sensitive approach to the waiting time, in line with game's mechanics.
For instance, we could agree that before engineers the ~40ly jump range of the anaconda was widely taken as the max speed a ship could go. We also know that it takes ~45 seconds to complete a jump before starting the next.
Hence, 40 ly / 45 seconds = 0.89 ly/sec. (I)
Then, 1 ly = 1.12 sec
From this, we get a waiting time in function of the distance, assuming the NPC pilot doing the transportation didn't have to bother with fuel scooping, route plotting, interdictions, or traveling in SC to the target station upon arrival to destination system.
We could, of course, add some 2 or 3 hundredths of seconds to the equation to account for that, but making a compromise here with instant supporters, let's leave it at that and call it a day.
Under that model, you would have to wait just 2 minutes and 48 seconds for a 150 light year transfer. Add a standard fee in credits per light year in transfers -say 2,000 credits?- and then you will have a system that makes sense within the Elite universe and will have people thinking twice before taking the decisions lightly.
Finally, just to be clear, the transfer mechanics is all welcomed, but needs to make sense within the immersion rules of Elite. It would negate many elements that have been well thought and designed so far.
