So, just an observation.
To begin with he "Beginners-focused" update is a very good idea, since Elite has terrible player retention. It's good for the community, for more people remain in the game, and it's good fro Frontier, for more people will keep playing/paying and suggest others to get the game. Win win.
Now, correct me if I'm wrong. We're told that:
The aim of the update is to make things a little easier initially for new players so they can get to grips with things. It's something we'll be keeping a close eye on to make sure it's all working as intended and your feedback will continue to be really helpful after it launches.
Part of the update is the new beginner areas, precluded to all but zeroeth-rank CMDRs.
What could the motivation of this gated communities be? How does it make it
easier? Well, since the interactions (direct or indirect) that the game affords between CMRDs are rather limited (so that, for ex. it's not possible for an experienced BHer to "clean up" the system, leaving no baddies for the newbie to hunt down) it seems pretty obvious that we're talking of more experienced CMDRs hunting the new guys, or the well-known phenomenon of sealclubbing. This seems to be confirmed by last year's C&P update which introduced the mechanic for which an higher bounty is received if a very expensive ship blows up a very cheap one. That is: FDev know about the sealclubbing issue.
So far, so good.
My point is: this is another bandaid over, and not a solution for, the sealclubbing/griefing problem. "Instead of designing a punishment/NPC police system that
really works (real high-sec areas) against something we do realise is a real problem (although we don't like to talk about it: sealclubbers are paying customers too), something which would take a lot of time and work -- let's just stop the baddies from coming in! Problem solved".
I think the feedback offered in this thread shows that it will not quite solve the problem. If i am dedicated enough to saltmining to fly around Eravate looking for SIdewinders, it really takes little effort to just use a fresh account,
especially on consoles where having a new account takes no effort at all.
As that guy said: "Never half-a$s two things.
Whole-
a$s one thing". Not sure Frontier got that particular memo.