Player Features and Ideas Discussion

tl;dr: I am not sure, if this topic has been discussed already tousands of times, since it is so obvious. It is about the fact that you need 18 ranks, 4.608.000sp more for missiles skills than for a gun system.

Walloftext:
All numbers are the rank of the skill. The rank says how much total sp you need for a skill, i.e.:
rank 1 = 256k sp
rank 2 = 2*256k sp = 256k sp
rank 5 = 5*256k sp = 1280k sp

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support

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missile lau. operation 1
target navi prediction 2
rapid launch 2
missile bombardment 2
missile projection 4
warhead upgrades 5
guided missile prec 5
total 20

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gunnery 1
controlled bursts 2
motion prediction 2
rapid firing 2
sharpshooter 2
surgical strike 4
trajectory analysis 5
total 18

In the support skills we got already a gap of 2 ranks, but while you can use the missile support skills only for one weapon system, you can use the gunnery support skills for three weapon system.
Let's continue to have a look at weapons at all, as example i choosed projectile as gunnery skill. It can be replaced with lasers or hybrids, the ranks are the same:

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small

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Rocket 1
________ spec 3
Light Missiles 2
________ spec 3
total 9

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s projectile 1
________ spec 3
________ spec 3
total 7

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medium

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heavy missile 3
________ spec 5
assault missile 3
________ spec 5
total 16

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m projectile 3
________ spec 5
________ spec 5
total 13

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large

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cruise missile 5
________ spec 8
torpedos 4
________ spec 8
total 25

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l projectile 5
________ spec 8
________ spec 8
total 21

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capital

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citadel cruise 7
citadel torpedos 7
total 14

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capital projectiles 7
total 7

Here we got a total gap of 16 ranks (4.096.000sp).
small 2
medium 3
large 4
capital 7
total 16
The specialization skills are inline with the gunnery skills again. But on the standard missile skills you need for each range, class a extra skill. If you look at the gunnery skills you need for each class one skill, which enables the long and short range gun. It ends threwith that you need to train twice so many standard missile skills as for the guns. Which ends in a gap of 16 total ranks which are still 4.096.000sp.
Just a random sidenote, if you train for something like a matar dread you will end with using 21 ranks of skills for your weapons, 14ranks for missile and 7 for the gun. While the Caldari dread pilots need only 14 ranks while amarr and gallente dread pilots (the best dreads btw) only need 7 ranks to train for their weapons.

We also have total useless missile skills like the fof and defender missile with a total of 5 ranks, just on a site note.

History, how the missiles skilltree evolved: In the first days of eve missiles skills were different to guns. You just had the standard missile skill, which were more ranks to train but you had just a few support skills like missile launcher operation and rapid firing. So far so good.
Back then missiles used to do always max damage on targets, but torpedos i.e. were to slow to catch fast ships like ceptors. They were just imba in pve, always max damage even with torps vs fr orbiting you ^^.
Well that got changed with the implementing of explosion velocity. They gave us more support skills, which increased the explosion velocity and missile velocity at all. With these new support skills, missiles were almost inline with the gunnery support skills considering the ranks, only a gab of 2 ranks. But the negative aspect of missiles that you always had to train a skill for short and long range never got changed. I assume it just got forgotten that you have so much more to train and never got questioned again.
How about fixing the ranks of missile skills, so it is balanced again to the gunnery skills?

PS: There are some unmentioned gunnery skills, but these are not being used exclusive for guns so i didn't list them.

so what? why you expect missiles having the same SP amount as guns?
Missiles arent guns.

advantage of missiles you dont need to train T2 lights and mediums, you can straight go for heavy BS sized class weapons, while you have to train all gun classes below to get the big ones.

theoretically, practically, noone uses citadel cruise.

Once you trained 3 missile spec the advantages is gone. It is a good thing for such races as amarr and gallente which got a random ship with missiles. But still caldari and matar got to train all or most of them. It could be used as argument that you got equal sp, but still not more.

@Lallante: Don't tell me it is an advantages that you can skill t2 cruise without support skills, since you might be able to train it but you still have to train the support skills to use them.

@Mark Hadden: Don't levis use citadel cruise? Citadel cruise were also used the most of the time for dreads.

Which is convenient because no-one uses normal cruise either.

You have to train small, medium, and large projectiles to 5 and all of the specializations to 4 to use T2 autocannons. You only have to train torpedoes or cruise missiles to 5 to use T2 torpedoes or cruise.

I suggest adding the calculation on total training time for training both Large Autocannon Specialization and Large Artillery Specialization to Lvl IV.

Missile and Guns are not the same, and thus have different training requirements.

Its actually easier to get T2 Launchers than T2 Guns.

Thats the point, missiles are a minor weapon system and yet they still need more than major weapon systems.