ChromeSDK

You definitely don't need 2 cores per instance. I am running a 3x3 with an 8700k (6 cores for 9 instances) and 32gb of ram perfectly smooth. My CPU usage on the server doesn't ever go above 90% and my ram usage is hardly over 80% at max load. No lag spikes, stuttering, etc. for anyone.

Open up your .json file in the ServerGridEditor, make sure "show ship paths" is checked at the bottom. Control+left click on a circle from each of the different ship paths and look for the box that says "AutoSpawnEveryUTCInterval" and change its value to what you want. I have the NPC trader paths set to 500 and the ghost ship path set to 2000 (so they are more rare).

Thanks! Yeah, that's how the template came that I got, so I didn't want to touch it until I got clarification since I wasn't sure what the unit of measure was. I will be sure to check out the vods, I already am quite a lurker in the stream, so I must have missed when you went over it.

It won't let me edit the above post, but I just wanted to add the merchant ships spawn rate is set to 60 and the ghost ship is set to 30.

Ah that's probably it! I knew I was missing something when I exported. But hey, while you are here, I am having another issue with your template. Ghost and merchant ships are continually spawning over and over again, making an infinite line of them along the path they have. I didn't touch any of their settings in the editor, the ship paths are all still exactly what the template was. The only thing I changed were a couple islands elsewhere on the map. Thank you again though for making these! They've been a great help.

So sometimes when we first select our spawn region, one of the grids will have a completely different name and ping than the ones I setup (the grid that shows up differently is not always the same grid, its different for everybody who tries to connect, but its always from the same server). They are someone else's grids, and when you connect to mine you have about a 50/50 chance of connecting to theirs, but if you log off and log back on, you'll connect to the correct one. Given that this doesn't happen 100% of the time and people can eventually connect to my server, it doesn't seem like there is any issue with the setup of the server, though I have checked the IP address about 5000 times for each of them. I am completely sure there is no problem with typing the wrong IP somewhere on my end. Any fix for this?

What do you mean down the road? NPC crews are in the current game, to my knowledge.