Guess I'll be that guy, then.

I don't think either dropships or tanks should be lower in price. If anything, make them more expensive, but more resilient. I wish heavies were treated in the same manner as well.

I'm a fan of big toys being able to do big things, at a big cost. And when you kill them, you feel good because you know somebody is crying their heart out.

2 things will happen

Either they reduce the prices so we can field more for less or they increase the prices but make the vehicle be able to take more damage

I prefer paying more for a better vehicle tbh

So u want cheap tanks eyh? Spam the battlefield with tanks and dropships. That will be fun.

Just the cost of prototype and maybe advanced infantry gear should go up. Leave everything else as it is. That's all that needs to be balanced ISK-wise.

I'd actually prefer prototype gear to become salvage from PvE missions when we get them, but that might be too extreme for some.

Then balance things through gameplay mechanics and content.

Add 'dispersion' to forge gun shots, for instance.
Make AV grenades take time to acquire a target to home in on. (ie. they fall near a vehicle and only 'magnetise' to it after a few seconds)
Have more swarm rockets, make them deal less damage each, increase knockback power slightly so that it jolts as much as flaylocks do now.
Reduce flaylock 'push' on dropships

etc.

Basically all we need to do is find the right price for prototype (and even advanced) gear that only in 1 out of 10 matches will you find someone using it. Right now, it's probably 9/10 public matches where prototype gear is found.

If it's expensive enough, no one will use it. You may argue those with fat wallets will. Well, fine. Let them burn some ISK on the glory of battle. Right now, they suffer minimal losses if they want to protostomp all day. There is no consequence. Everyone knows that. Previously I suggested raising prices of prototype gear to the equivalent of a HAV. People told me: "but that won't matter when EVE floods DUST with ISK". Well, no ****! So if that's the case, how bad will the problem be now, if we don't jack up those prices?

If we had a market and economy dictated by the players, you would see this eventually balance itself out.

I think you are missing a few things:

- While AV causes a lot of damage if it downs a tank, it doesn't do much anything else. It doesn't nearly have the battlefield presence that a tank has, nor does it provide nearly the amount of rewards.

- A tank will leave a path of destruction that can easily rival whatever the AV takes out over the duration of a game. You don't have to cause all that loss to the AV guy to "get even".

- Everyone is infantry. Vehicles are not an alternative to infantry, they are an add on. You pay for the additional power, and it ensures that vehicles are not fielded thoughtlessly in every battle.

I'm not saying that vehicles are fine, they are clearly not, I just don't agree with your reasonings for balancing around ISK. I believe that vehicles should always be a luxury, to keep their usage on public servers in check (and at least when it comes to tanks, nobody can say that we don't see enough of them being used already...).

No... I don't think they should ever balance the core stats of a suit or vehicle around its isk price.

They should create and balance without even considering isk price and then come back and determine an isk price that is appropriate for each item's power.

As a fyi this is getting addressed in verc blance pass of 1.4