Wars waging as the Thargoid come into the fringe of the bubble would give CMDRs opt in/out gameplay.
Missions to evacuate settlements from systems in utter turmoil where the BGS is reflecting the apocalypse unfolding in the area would be interesting. Along with CMDRs under taking fighter escort missions for convoys from Capital ships offering cover at these locations. CMDRs in ships escorting ships in/out of the system (eg: through asteroid fields) could be engaging, especially working together with other CMDRs, or indeed even with NPC wingmen (giving simple commands such as attack this, defend that). Defending damaged vessels under assault while repair ships shuttle in supplies could be nice for CMDRs in fighters or other ships...
...But this of cause would all have required these sorts of "tools" to have been added over the past 1-2 years so they were ready in place for the game to then leverage for the first time, the only first time, CMDRs encounter aggressive aliens...
BUT, we've not had such investment put in the game (it would seem), so instead we have CQC, The Engineers, passenger missions, Multi-Crew and sun glasses to use to make the best of the approaching event...
Going to be interesting to see what 2.4 offers... I do hope it's not just light weight gameplay under the guise of story heavy "stuff"... And more cryptic paper chases around systems...