This paper presents a study of topological characteristics of mobile wireless ad-hoc networks. The characteristics studied are connectivity, coverage, and diameter. Knowledge of topological characteristics of a network aids in the design and performance prediction of network protocols. This paper introduces intelligent goal-directed mobility algorithms for achieving desired topological characteristics. A simulation-based study shows that to achieve low, medium and high network QoS defined in terms of combined requirements of the three metrics, the network needs respectively 8, 16, and 40 nodes. If nodes can fail, the requirements increase to 8, 36 and 60 nodes respectively. We present a theoretical derivation of the improvement due to the mobility models and the sufficient condition for 100% connectivity and coverage. Next, we show the effect of improved topological characteristics in enhancing QoS of an application level protocol, namely, a location determination protocol called Hop-Terrain. The study shows that the error in location estimation is reduced by up to 68% with goal-directed mobility.