compromized nav beacon

Hey all, haven't played a massive amount since pre-engineering and loving the new corsair and wanted to make a well tuned CZ build for it. I used to do a bunch in my old Courier, clipper and fdl back in the day. Made a few builds and would like some input on them, or what you run on it. Would...

Am I imagining things, or do NPCs scale with our ships? I would think the answer has to be "No", but allow me to explain why I'm even asking. Before VR, the humble Vulture was my favorite combat ship. With the right engineering, weapons, and piloting skills, I could take on most enemies...