So, right now... What we have is basically suits and skill bonuses that were given seemingly arbitrary assignments to each suit type with little relation to one another. This creates a whole slew of problems, that have been covered by dozens of people in hundreds of threads in the last 15+ months of dust, which I don't feel bear repeating, since they can easily be summed up as "Nothing is really in a good place right now. Just because everything is bad doesn't mean it's balanced"


With Uprising, CCP at least made some attempt to create a 'racial identity' amongst the suits, varying their bonuses and slot layouts somewhat. While this is the right move, it was not done in the right way. The idea of racial identify needs to be expanded on, as it's an excellent method of creating a distinct role definition for each race and their specializations.


My proposition is as follows :

Homogenize in order to diversify. Start each suit of a given class off with the exact same stats, and then create a set of racial modifiers, followed by specialization modifiers . Within certain allotment restrictions this creates the end result of wildly different suits, with the same general amount of stats, allocated differently. This eliminates all worry of one suit inexplicably having better stats than others, with no explanation as to why.


Example :

Standard Light frame could look like this-

120 shield // 120 armor
1 High // 1 Low // 1 Equipment // 1 Grenade
XX PG // YY CPU
1 Light weapon /// 1 Sidearm Weapon
(Snipping out other stats as they are not needed for this example)


Then one could create racial identities like as follows :


Caldari Light frame :

+50% shield // -50% armor
+1 High slot // -1 Low Slot
(Snip)

Gallente Light Frame "

-50% Shield // +50% Armor
-1 High slot // +1 Lowslot


After those were applied, you could apply Specialization modifiers for say scout suits;

Caldari Scout :

+20% shield. // -40% armor // +X HP shield recharge

Gallente Scout :

-40% shield // + 20% armor // +X passive armor repair




I think these limited examples are enough to illustrate the idea. What is not illustrated, is how to determine what to take and what to add. Essentially, each tier (Militia, Standard, Advanced, and Prototype) would be given a set amount of "Allocation Points" for their stats. Each stat itself would have it's own cost in points to improve, and reward points for applying a penalty which could then be used to improve another stat.

For example, a Low or High slot could be worth 10 allocation points, Shield/Armor HP be worth 5 points every 20 HP, Equipment slots worth 15, Sidearm slots 20, Speed 5 points every .5m/s. And so forth.

These are just rough numbers, and definitely not what each should be. Just using them to help explain the idea. Essentially, They could create the racial identifies something like

"Caldari = Lots of shield, almost no armor, medium speed, low equipment slots"

"MInmatar = Medium shield, Low armor, High speed, High amount equipment slots"

"Gallente =Low shield, High armor, medium speed, low equipment slots"

"Amarr: High shield, High armor, low speed, low equipment slots, decreased slot layout"


Again, these are not suggestions for how the actual racial identities should be, but just examples of how the system should play out. Like said at the start of the post, CCP already attempted something like this, but the allocation of the stats seems arbitrary at best. The purpose of this suggestion is to establish a base line for all suits first, and then diversify from there.


Once the base line of suits + survivability has been established, the first stage of a proper complete balance pass is accomplished. After that, one can then move on to weapons. (But that is a subject for another post entirely)
Edit : Forgot to mention : Revising skill bonuses is also a requisite step in this. Skill bonuses need to be logical and practical.



If this idea takes off, I'd like to request some of the more awesome number crunchers to help conceptualize and flesh out this idea to determine the ideal roles + allocations for an actual proposition to CCP.