I am making up the cost of buying & equipping a T9. I have found a nice trade route that will in 13 runs generate profit to the tune of the 100 million that the ship cost. All fine & dandy, except that on the return leg some NPC keeps intercepting me. He never actually pulls me out of super-cruise. I out fly him every time (remember I am flying a T9) , but just about every trip he tries. This has now got beyond tedious. Either the game could be adapted to make NPC pirates a real danger or just remove them
Interesting that you present two options there yet only reference one of them in your thread title. I agree completely with your premise that NPC interdiction attempts are nothing more than an irritation these days but the solution I would prefer is for them to be made an actual challenge again. A good start would be making it so that I can't just outfly an NPC interdiction attempt from a Courier or Viper in my T9. It's laughable.
I also don't fly with weapons on my T9. Thing is, I never used to do back when there was a decent chance of being successfully interdicted by an NPC either.