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I am liking this idea.
A setup with fewer but harder enemies that require people to adapt is something that i think is most welcomed.
Also they remind me of that guy from the end of the SOE epic arc, 2 enemies that need other than the usual lvl 1 mission tactics to beat, that was fun.

Why not make this part of bonus objectives of all lvl4 missions with the acceleration gate on the last room? This way people can still get the normal rewards and attempt the frigate boss fight at the end?

Another alternative is for enemies in lvl4 missions to drop "passkeys" to these hidden pirate lairs where players can warp to and do them separately. These keys can even be sold on the market.

This. Many people loathe the normal lvl 4 mission. So in the end these missions will only benefit the people who wants to run lvl 4 missions and I think a far majority of the people who already runs lvl 4 missions wouldn't care much about these as it requires them to reship.

But I think it's great that you are on the direction of offering pve content that reflects pvp combat.

Will these come for Pirate L4 missons as welll ?

Price of Worm shooting up 50% in 3..2..1..

Neuting these NPCs won't have any effect, unfortunately.

Although these NPCs will be using some improved tactics compared to other NPCs they still rely on the same back-end. However simultaneous work is being performed on improving our NPC and content creation tools, and these missions will serve as excellent testing grounds for future NPC advancements.

I definitely understand the desire of many people to be able to run these missions at will, but unfortunately these missions will simply be too good to make them available all the time. I really like the idea of doing something with long cooldowns like the epic arcs in a future iteration, thanks for that feedback.

That would likely require editing every l4 mission there is, and then QA'ing them to make sure nothing broke.

I much prefer these Burner missions to be a random draw... after all, Fozzie did say they want to avoid farmability, especially given that they can drop faction loot.

Fozzie: can you detail the general reward base for these? Is there an emphasis on ISK payouts, or LP? How much of either could one expect? Would you also consider adding these to the L5 security agent pool?

Are you going to limit it so only the player who receives the mission can enter the area, cause if not then players will just bring more people in to kill the 1 guy.

Danger to shipping in the cluster's shipping eh?

Also, just a refresher on what effects work on NPCs:

You said neuts won't work.
I know that webs and painters work.
What about scrams to turn off their MWD?
ECM to break lock entirely? ecm modules and/or drones?
Will nos treat the npc as having 100% cap the whole time? not give any cap at all? give a set amount?

Also, to make these more difficult/fun, would using sleeper ai make any sort of difference?

Will it always be us versus 1 frigate, or can there sometimes be pairs of them (one to ecm/neut the player, the other to dps maybe)?

Are these meant to be doable with t2 ships/gear, or is the player pretty much forced to go for more expensive ships/mods?