All true, but nobody complains much because real haulers train for t2 industrials and never go back. In the t2 lineup, the races are indeed balanced against each other. Not to invalidate your point, but just to explain why it gets so little attention.

Like i said in the other topic, you have to check background story before changing something that would **** it up. Gallente had a capitalistic economy well before other factions adopted the same kind of economy with the formation of Concord, so it just make sense that their civilian haulers are more develloped to fit the needs of its people.

Maybe instead of looking whats wrong with the current ship specs for the economic arms race why not fill the "holes" with new higher tier skill level designs where needed?

Don't neccesarily have to consider total m3, even though this will be the most preferd and obvious choice. Just mentioning that certain advantages could lend themselves to things like wrap drive improvements as an alternative choice for economy improvements for haulers.

Gallente have the best T1 hauler, but only if you train to lvl V, and you have to buy a new ship at every lvl.

At lvl IV the Mammoth is bigger.

Lvl III and below, it is the Bestower.

About transports, Impel is the biggest and has almost the same cargo as Ity V.

when it comes to t1 indy's it's all about capacity cause not much else matters because they're high sec ships pretty much all the time.

Keeping races diverse is key in my opinion, a connection to eve lore as well as creating different demands for diffrent ships. If they were similar all in all, the only difference would be the 3d model. That wouldnt be very much fun. Also, piloting the Itty mkV requires a higher skillevel, SP that could have been spent on something else which all in all gives it the current system somewhat of a balance.

... so, by this reasoning, the Charon should be no bigger than any of the other freighters?

Just to add, if we're looking at industrials, can we address the ludicrous tanking bonus on the t2? I mean, the transports are fine and don't need buffed, but the fact that DST and BR both get tank bonus is kind of a non sequitur.

So this thread is sticking solely to the imbalances in t1 indy ships and how much more powerful the itty 5 is over the rest.

Like I said, if you were to try and implement the OP nature of the itty V to a combat ship, then you would come out with a ship with the tank of a rattlesnake, and the dps of the nightmare.

are you talking about the t2's that get a tanking bonus that almost doesn't matter because they can still be instapopped by the same ships or something else?

But all ships are unbalanced... Would you say a Proteus is better than a Tengu ? Doubtfull.

Badger mkII has small cargo but Charon is the biggest freighter. Just looking industrials isn't enough...

I can haz ?

Believe it or not, but me and a corp mate made a test: Him in a Tornado vs me in an Occator. He did all he could but I escaped. I just jammed and cloaked

I did tank for several minutes. I had full set of active armor hardeners and a med repper.

You don't fit cargo expanders on those, do you ? DO YOU ?

To break into enemy lines the Viator is way better, you can fit covert ops cloak and warp cloaked.

However, indies aren't balanced in different manners, they all do the same thing. If one was faster, one had more tank, one had more m3, and the other had a faster warp speed, then it would make sense. However, the itty 5 is at the top of the charts in tank and m3, only slower by 1m/s, and has the same warp speed. If you figure everything it's a better overall ship.

Seems that you forget the sp required for the itty V, its nothing you train in a day. I would call that a balancing factor. Not everyone trains it just for sheer fun the first thing they do. It is not balancing the specific stats for the ship, agree on that*, however, you have to train quite a while to fly it. You sacrifice close to a month, time that could have been spent on training tradingskills that allows you to place more orders, cut tax or whatever floats your boat. Sometimes one needs to take a step back to see the bigger picture.

Now, as far as the comments made on freighters and t2's, you can't balance the t1's based on what the t2's can do.

that's just ludicrous.

That's would be like saying that scorpions and ravens should have less dps, tank, and less jam on the scorpion because the widow and the golem are powerful replacements.

Most gallente pilots won't use transports in high sec because they itty 5 holds so much more m3, and cost much less.

if you were to tell me that the badger mark II had a 9 au warp time instead of the 4.5 that all the itty's have, then I would understand it's low cargo.

If you were to say that the amarr indy was the second highest indy but the reason for it being 10k below the itty 5 is because it can fit 2 medium or large guns, then I would understand that.

If you were to say that the minmatar indy was the second lowest because it could fit a heftier tank that was more cap stable, then I would understand that.

However, this isn't the case. The itty 5 warps at the same speed as the rest, as over 10k m3 more than the next closest t1, can fit a heftier, more cap stable armor or shield tank than the rest, is only 1 m/s slower than the slowest.

Basically what i'm getting at is that if the gallente have a t1 option that is this capable, then they don't have to spend over 100mil in high sec on a transport ship. so why should the other races have to spend that much isk just to get more hauling capacity in high sec?

Again, you can't balance t1 ships based off how powerful their t2 counterparts are.