(I've played around with all Commandos, heavy focus on Gallente with moderate on Minmatar. I'll avoid writing a multi-paragraph segment bragging about how many things I have trained.)

I fully agree that the Commando and Assault are largely redundant, and honestly in Legion they could combine most the bonuses/abilities into one suit and it would make a really solid role. But alas our bastard child that is the Commando exists, so we need to make due. I think it's fine that the Commando and Assault fill very similar roles, the important part is making each one fulfill a different facet of that role.

I think first we need to determine what the role of the Assault is under existing mechanics. Once we've determined that, we can see what other facets of the role the Commando could fulfill, without overly compartmentalizing the Assault role.

Assaults

Moderate-High Mobility: Well suited for closing distances and moderate flanking.

Weapon Support Bonuses: Offsets the weakness of Racial Weapons with Bonuses

Moderate Base HP-High Slot Count: Flexible yet capable of Moderate-High HP when fitted.

Medium Hitbox: Capable of relying on speed/hitbox to mitigate some incoming DPS

Weapon Fitting Bonus: Able to fit Higher tiered Light Weapons and Grenades with less cost.

So basically you have a role which is very mobile, and while not as quick as the scout, can still make use of less direct methods of getting from A to B. That is to say they are direct combat oriented, but not necessarily completely frontal assault.

They are not necessarily maximum damage dealers, as they don't actually boost the damage output of the weapon. Instead, bonuses offset negative attributes of their racial weapons, which in turn makes each weapon more flexible and viable in suboptimal situations.

In short, the Assault personifies direct but non-frontal combat, with a primary focus of flexibility and adaptability in the slaying role. Assaults are capable of putting focused DPS where it needs to go at the right time in order to get the job done cleanly.

So now what we've defined what the Assault does, let's look at some things that it doesn't do and discuss how we can tie those concepts into defining what the Commando should do.

Concepts to Consider and Discuss:

Direct Frontal Attacking (Higher Defense - Lower Mobility)
Maximum Damage Output (Bonuses to Damage)
Sustained Damage Output (Bonuses to Reload)
Quantity Over Quality (Suppression Abilities)
Less Flexible - More Focused Role (Buff Strengths of Weapons)

Additional Points of Contention:
Little Incentive to use Prototype (Only 2 additional slots) and extremely Low Slot Count in general (2/3/4) when other suits have upwards of (4/6/8). Just as a starting measure the Commando should have the same slot layout as the Sentinels.

Suppression without range is worthless. As I said before, at the ranges all weapons operate suppressive fire is meaningless. Advance and kill will always be the more meaningful choice. The only suppression weapon in the game that deserves the name is the laser rifle.

And your solution does not address the comparative worthlessness of the amarr commando compared to the amarr assault. The overheat will always mean thatt ammandos will always be less efficient combatants than amarr assault.

Making commandos into suppressors without giving them a range advantage will always be another bloody bandaid fix.

I feel like break in has the perfect idea for commandos. The only thing I would change is to give caldari commandos a +5% to regulators and rrechargers as a bonus, as energizers count as rechargers for the purposes of calculating bonuses to those modules. Other than that, keep it exactly the same.

Then we would easily reach shield levels rivaling or surpassing sentinels and we want to avoid that.

I would suggest that the slot layout be normalized to sentinel. Trading the grenade slot for the equipment slot seems ok, and honestly grenades are gimped anyway. The PG/CPU might need to be a bit looser because there is no 25% fitting reduction for weapons on the commando.

Universal role bonus: +Damage to racial weapons. I'd go with 3% per level as 10% is more or less negligible as far as output goes.

Defensive bonus: Significant bonuses for recovery following racial themes. Gallente: Armor rep mods, Amarr: Plate speed penalty reduction, Minmatar: regulator bonus or on-board ammo nano-regeneration systems (slower than hives/supply depots, but perhaps 1 bullet per second per level, mass driver shells at a rate of 1 every 6 seconds minus 1 per level, same for swarms), Caldari: boost to recharger/energizer/regulator efficacy.

Offensive bonus: a unique attack bonus that will allow the suits to be used in sustained attacks This is where i think we should dip OUTSIDE normal racial thematics.

EG gallente might get a flat bonus to speed by incorporating minmatar movement tech.

Amarr might gain a bit of range by incorporating Caldari tech into their laser optics and targeting systems. (think long range suppression and counter-sniper)

Minmatar might gain a bonus to biotics and become even MORE obnoxiously fast attack to complement the gallente allies.

Caldari might seek to emulate amarr laser utility by deploying smaller, higher density ammunition allowing longer sustained fire and better battlefield longevity by carrying more rail ammunition.

Role suggestions along similar thematics:

Commandos should be able to fall into one of the four following depending on fit.

1: Shocktrooper. Mission is to locate, close with and destroy enemy hardpoints. This should include things such as breaking into areas heavily defended and being able to occupy sentinels while the assaults do the actual work.

2: Fire Support/Suppression: We all know how this works. Lob mass driver shells, laser rifles, PLC shells at enemy positions, etc. This includes counter-snipers. This is the AV blanket role.

3: assassin hunter: finding poorly damped single enemies who specialize in ambushes/knifing and killing them.

4: Saboteur: delivery of mines and remote explosives to enemy targets.

Honestly I think commandos are best rigged for raw damage, recovery and detection instead of raw HP.

The one thing I'm not wanting at all is more HP creep.

Then they would creep on the Amarr and Caldari scout roles. Shocktrooper shouldn't be hunting. The scout should locate, and the assault should close with and destroy the enemy. Commandos should ensure that the enemy is unable toaneuver and keep the enemy pinned while the assaults close with and destroy.

I would see their regen buffed exceedingly, an increase to their extra damage, and an extra slot with pg/CPU to match. They should hit hard, but move slow. They are better for standing in one area and shooting the enemy and keeping them pinned, while the assaults flank for the kill.

there is absolutely no point in giving commandos a scan range/precision bonus if fully range modded they can only detect just outside the tiny inner ring, and they cannot fit enough precision to catch an undamped scout.

that radar has a 120m range. the three rings correspond to 40 meter increments, the tiny ring is "under 20" Everyone who is not a calscout is pretty much limited to halfway between the tiny ring and the next ring at best.

I've avoided altering PG/CPU values at this time due to the parity with Sentinel suits, since in some cases normalizing PG/CPU of Commandos to Sentinel levels would actually result in a reduction of the raw stats.

I acknowledge that a fittings shift in PG/CPU has a significant likelihood of being called for but I would rather have game data to support that before recommending a change which would push Commando fittings levels beyond those of the - recently deemed to be too substantial and thus scaled down - values of the Sentinels who are sporting the same High/Low slot layouts.

I'll do a side by side work up on comparative shield regen rates within the races, thank you for reminding me of that aspect, I apologize for the omission.

No Cross, the commando damage bonusing needs another pass.

The DPS benefit over a similar assault is right around 2% given similar damage mods setups.

The Amarr Commando is of particular note in that it cannot compete with the assault AT ALL due to tge assault heat reduction.

People fixate on the commando damage bonus but all it does is allow offensive parity with assaults, not offensive superiority.

You see the most egregious example of this when people talk about the minmatar commando utilizing swarms.

A minmatar commando with two damage mods kills with explosives at the EXACT SAME number of shots as a triple modded assault suit. The damage bar seems to move faster, TTK does not change.

The amarr commando is particularly obnoxious in that it gets only one damage mod slot where the assault gets 3. The assault also gets up to 25% heat reduction. This means the commando has lower potential DPS per shot as well as suffering lower sustained fire time.

The damage bonus currently provides only a placebo effect, not an actual advantage. Until this is addressed in one form or another, or the commandos have a clear operational advantage that cannot be negated by a standard assault fit then the class will not be balanced.

Suppose it was bumped to 4% per level?