kinde of nice ideas and read till I read this sentence

"The problem, however, is that there is no way in hell a basic Amarr Assault is going to use all of their High Slots for a Precision Enhancer or a third of their Low Slots for a Profile Dampener. This ebb and flow, counter-play is simply not going to happen at the basic suit level because the rewards are not high enough."

If ANY suit is not going to "use all high slots or 1/3 of low slots for profile dampener" then that suit (and the player in this suit) can go flux themselves.

So all high and all lows tank is cool and all lows and high with EWAR (as if a pointer on a map was worthy of that name...) is bad? What kind of twisted logic is that?

We have to make sure we adjust CPU/PG to accommodate the new slots. If new players have to leave module slots empty because they don't have the CPU/PG to fill them then we are right back where we are now.

Not at all! Currently, the only practical difference between Militia and Basic (excluding weapons) is usually the skill requirement. But if a basic suit had as many slots as a pro suit, you'd actually have a reason to use basic stuff over militia stuff.

I also think that increasing the CPU/PG of basic suits would go against the spirit of the proposal.

Not at all! Currently, the only practical difference between Militia and Basic (excluding weapons) is usually the skill requirement. But if a basic suit had as many slots as a pro suit, you'd actually have a reason to use basic stuff over militia stuff.

I also think that increasing the CPU/PG of basic suits would go against the spirit of the proposal.

P.S. If a person did find themselves with empty slots because of the fancy stuff they were putting in other slots, that would incentivize them to move to ADV level, or ADV to PRO. If anything, I suspect this might help players decide what type of suit (assault, logi, etc.) they're more passionate about! But keep in mind I'm saying this as a noob-vet; I don't have any PRO suit access yet.

And new players who have no skills in fitting would be uable to deploy. As it is, a max skills character couldn't fit an all militia fit, so a player with only 500,000 SP will definitely be unable to fill all the slots.

So either up the fitting space, or just don't do it at all.

Actually, you only have to fill one weapon slot on any dropsuit to have a valid fitting.

Imagine your a new player fresh into the game and you go to use a starter fit, which now has the same slots as Proto but is all militia BPO gear. Which is great. Except the PG and CPU were never buffed to match the slot increase, meaning you're starter fit is over the limit and now you can't deploy in your suit. If you try to make your own fittings, you'll have to leave module slots empty just to be able to run the suit, which defies the point of increasing the slot count in the first place.

For me, I would have the Starter fits still be what they are now. It could be a good tool for the hypothetical new players (HNP). "Cool, I have these suits! I can kill people." "Wait, why does this suit have so many more slots? Alright, I guess I will build this suit just like that one."

For Militia suits, I am little torn. On one hand, it sucks for the HNP to have the ONLY suit they can use being so so much weaker than even the Basic Suit. A Militia Medium Caldari Frame would have 2/1/1 while a Basic Medium Caldari Frame would have 4/3/1. That doesn't amount to too much extra HP, like 100 with Basic modules, but it is still a concern. The concern is that the new players is making a choice in race before knowing what the hell each race does, but that is of course off topic.

I would suggest that Basic and Advanced suits get what is underlined in the proposal while Militia and Starter suits do not. It provides a LOT of power very early. For less than 60k SP, they can get a suit that is far more threatening than what is currently possible. It gives them a big juicy carrot to make themselves a superior suit.

Frames would probably need a nerf in the CPU/PG department, believe it or not. The Basic Medium Frame is 195/37 while the Basic Caldari Assault has 178/27. Either the Frame needs a reduction or the Basic Assaults need a buff.

Keep the discussion going and, please, keep it in lines with the original topic.

Thanks everyone!

I remember suggesting this about 12-18 months ago. Many many people have pushed for a pseudo tiercide of dropsuits at one point or another.

I actually got a direct response from Rattati about it once. He said something along the lines of "Its not a bad idea, but I won't do it. Dust is tiered dropsuits and its staying that way". Curious if his stance has changed on this topic since.

A huge problem in Dust is that customization is such a key factor, and building dropsuits is a truly core mechanic to the experience. Yet unless you are quite rich and can run proto suits often you are stuck running suits with almost no modules. I tried to convey that point, saying if you limit CPU/PG on these suits then you really don't get much bang for your buck on standard suits anyways, but having 5-6 slots to play with even at standard level is so much more engaging than the pitiful 2-3 that you currently get, even less for non-med suits.

Additionally, it would help lower the percieved power gap between vets and new players. If a new player sees a proto suit and is like, "I can't ever compete, he has twice the slots than I do and all these passives... F' it I give up /ragequit", I really think many of those types of players in a pseudo-tiercide system would be like, "Well I don't have the same CPU/PG than that proto suit but I can build the same suit and get pretty close! Man I want that proto suit". Its not really about how large the power gap actually is, its just about how players perceive that gap to be that matters in terms of retention.

Sorry for the wall. TL;DR / Bullet point version:

* All Dropsuits, regardless of Tier, receive the same layout as their Prototype counter-part. CPU/PG is the only thing that increases from Basic to Advanced to Prototype.

* Makes advancing suits easier because you upgrade modules rather than receive 3 additional slots.

* Removes the terrible layout scaling that many dropsuits have.

* Provides a large boost of power to the new player.

* Allows suits lower than Prototype to be built in more varieties of ways.

* The model is exactly how current Tanks work.