The bonuses on ships can reduce the amount of fits it could potentially use as if you don't fit according to the Ships bonuses you might as well buy something else.

The new SOCT cruiser that they may add looks fairly generic and does have bonuses to everything but it may be a limited edition one off.

If anything I like the idea of a ship with 5 rig slots and a bonus to all fitted rigs as well as a neutral slot layout like the Gnosis.

A battlecruiser class may not be viable as it could encroach on the T3 cruisers. Make it either a Battleship or a Frigate.

We need T3 BCs and T3 BS that were promised years ago. Should've been done by now. Instead, CCP just ditched products of the best and more successful expansion of Eve.

This would add an unknown to fights since each one could be very different depending on how the pilot likes to fly which means engagements would be more exciting.

You mean more random. Fewer engagements determined by skill and planning and more by sheer luck. EVE currently strikes a great balance where you have good freedom to fit your ship in different ways, but not so much that individual ships have no identity and opponents have no idea what they're up against when they see it.

Further, such an open system is almost impossible to balance properly. See: t3 cruisers.

Drake gets 25% to resists and 25% to damage at max level.

It gets 50% to kinetic damage, but I see your point. Looking at the Gnosis as an example of versatility, the modular mechanic, while attractive, is not necessary. Realistically, what your portraying is, IMO, how T3 should be, not the OP monsters they are now.

I say this and I have 5 of them for various activities between my accounts.

The concept of "give and take", rather than "give and give" seems like it would be easier to balance than the current T3's. A blank canvas of a ship, with the sub's dictating the final result.

I think this could work for the rebalance of T3 more so than the introduction of a new hull. Maybe then T3 could be introduced to other hulls. Versatility being the whole point, rather than just adding more power to an already powerful hull, you would need to give something to gain something.

I can completely agree with your assessment. I own a Tengu but only used it for speed tanking missions. While it was fun I could see where the dps was OP compared to a BS for the same missions. T3's should be jack of all trades, master of none but in their current form they do have areas where they are the best option and this should never be the case.

I'd like to see the mold broken even more so that a Tengu could mount lasers, run drones, or tank armor as well as having shield and missile options.

As long as it's could fit and not getting a bonus towards technology that the race doesn't use, I'm fine with that.

Of course, there is always the oopportunity for a Jove like T3 that could have subs for just about everything. Maybe the SOCT could create it and its development could be leaked to the public by an entity such as The Broker.

All that said, I am intersted in a concept that someone brought up a few months ago. Building your own pirate ships. If there was a way to combine tech from different races to create unique ships, I would be very interested in that.

No, I don't mean random. I meant unknown.

When you see a drake you know it's missile fit, when you see a ferox it's just about gonna be blaster and rails are easy to identify. Before the engagement even starts you know the optimum actions to take based on the role each ship is designed to fill.

Yes, I know there are times when someone pulls off a fit that is unusual but these types of fits are almost always situational, the entire fleet has to be built around the oddball, and they are rarely used.

What I want to see is a ship that when you see it you aren't sure how it will be fit. You can get some idea by the fleet it's in, but you can't be sure. A small gang could fly nothing but those ships and opponents couldn't be sure of what they were up against until the engagement started.

The modular BC would get 15% to resists and a max of 15% to damage. So why would I want the modular BC if it's more expensive and has smaller bonus?

Because with the MBC I could change that 15% to resists to a buffer focused build, I could put on HAMs with a 15% dmg bonus, Add in a speed subsystem at the cost of reduced capacitor, and fight as a close in brawler with missiles. Someone else could put on an active shield tank, go with neuts and drones, use capacitor boosting subsystems, and fight as a shield neut ship.

I know they are working on balancing the ships, but I think the game would be more fun with more variety. There has to be an effective way of giving players more options in ship design and not pigeon holing players into a specific fit because of bonuses and soft stats.