The pilot suits should be for pilots only! not and not for tank drivers or gunners.

The pilot suit should be required to run a tank or dropship. LAV's are fine as they are.

Tanks and dropships should be gimped for all but pilot suit users. Use of a proto pilot suit should grant vehicles the prowess they currently have, but without it they should be fragile tinder boxes at militia and basic.

We need more SP sinks. With every respec we get more and more EZ mode buttmunches.

You can't use heavy weapons without a heavy suit. Support equipment without the appropriate logistics suit will soon be 25% weaker. If you want to use a cloak without screwing your fitting you need a scout.

Vehicle module cycle time and recovery should require a pilot suit, otherwise it'll be 25% worse. Other vehicle attributes should be influenced by a racial suit and vehicle matched set once we have parity.

I'm also a firm believer that you shouldn't be able to sit in the pilot seat without having the appropriate skills.

Why shouldn't a pilot require the appropriate suit to properly interface with his vehicle? Why should any merc be able to operate a vehicle his hasn't had any training in?

I don't think the suits should be required, but it should be needed for full performance. LAVs don't need module performance unless you are running specialized fits, so yes, they will be fine as is.

The pilot suit modules should affect aspects of vehicle performance. If you want to spend the money for a full proto suit you get more benefit. Otherwise, high skill on a standard suit works like regular suits.

That is pretty fun.

Well, given CCP's precedent with the Logi skill change and equipment nerfs, I'm sure vehicles will be dialed back if pilots suits are given a bonus to vehicle aspects. My ideas:

Suit Bonus: 2% increase to all resistances per level

Gallente: 2-3% increase to armor repair amount per level
Caldari: 5% increase to shield extender amount per level
Minmatar: 3-5% increase to vehicle agility (not speed) per level
Amarr: 2-3% increase to base armor and armor plates per level

Yup this. This is exactly what we should be doing. Make a medium/light suit designed around light AV and buff the heavy AV(like the Forge Gun) back up. Shouldn't need a heavy AV suit because their lack of speed and inflexibility wouldn't be viable.

Radar, or a data link allowing you to see enemy contacts encountered by your whole team and not just your squad. countermeasure, increased power/Cpu, ability to use more complex aircraft, module or the ability to ovrload systems. increased module effectiveness ect

Some people already had SP in Pilotsuits after Uprising 1.5 I think. So I guess they will come sooner or later.

I never understood all this talk of a "pilot" suit, considering the layout of DS cockpits.

i really believe that you shouldn't be able to drive or pilot any vehicle without locking yourself into it. would keep blue berry rdvs from smashing vehicle, and it would stop tank spams and to some extent red line rails.

I like this, and I'm pretty sure you are right. If Pilot suits became a thing, then they would probably look like this to an extent.
I still don't like the idea of hard number-bonuses though, I would much rather that a "unique" suit was actually unique in what it offered, but it's probably unavoidable.

My idea:
Automatic pilot suit bonus: Augmented senses. The pilot plugs directly into the vehicle's Ai and sensor systems net, granting the following bonuses: 3rd person perspective and missile/proxy warning (even if not limiting operation to pilot-suited mercs only, I would still force them into a 1st person view and cut them off from any early warning system the vehicle had unless they wore the suit)
Per level bonus: Would have to be racial, and probably non-vehicle class specific. If it's an Amarr suit, it needs to apply to all Amarr vehicles or the system would be too clunky.

Perhaps:
Gallente: Repping rate bonus?
Caldari: Recharge rate bonus?
Minmatar: Booster increase bonus?
Amarr: Capacitor charge extension? (see what i did there?)

(Edit: To gain the bonus, a module of that type would need to be installed first, after which:)
I would set these bonuses to a rate equal to 1/5 of the relevant module, so that at proto level you would essentially gain a free module of that type. But then I would also make the fitting of ALL modules slightly more expensive.
The suit itself I would give racial stats, but no slots other than a sidearm and one equipment. At the very most, I would simply make it a frontline fitting.
It should exist to give a pilot a slight edge, not make vehicles broken, or turn them into nothing more than expensive EHP buffers without it....

The way I see it, vehicles are in a pretty good place. I wouldn't want to buff them, nor really nerf them too much. Those innate damage resistances can probably go though, given the lowered damage capabilities of their squishier opponents.
(As a matter of fact, I think damage resistances in general are a really bad idea.)

Sigh. In the end this is probably all just pointless hot air. It would be far easier for CCP to simply remove the Pilot Suit entry than to hammer room for it in three whole skill trees plus vehicle game mechanics. I had an enormous amount of fun writing it though, so win?