Ships & Modules

I think they should start by increasing the Sensor Strength, add 25m3 Drone Space but not Bandwidth for Salvage Drones (Can be used for spares as well but whatever.).

Second they should take a peak at the bonuses.

Paladin: - Web Bonus + Apoc 7.5% Opt Bonus
Kronos: Dunno if they want to go Blasters or Rails. I think they should reduce MWD Cap Consumptions for Battleships so they run almost as long as a 10mn on a Battlecruiser. - Web + 10% Falloff for Blasters or 10% Opt for Rails.
Vargur: as is.
Golem: - TP Bonus. +15% Flight Time, 5% Explosion Velocity modified to 7.5% Explosion Velocity. The extra range lets you use the new Rigor Rigs instead of Range Rigs combined with the increased Expvol with a marginal drop in Painter Effectiveness.

Those would be my personal changes. Web and such bonuses are nice but I think this would bring these ships out.

Marauders simply got nerfed way more than was deserved in the first place. Sensor strength, resist and overall hp is below average compared to even T1 and this is for a ship that's meant to be significantly better than it's T1 counterpart in most areas.

I honestly dont care if its bad or not, the new vargur model makes me want to fly one right goddamn now.

The reason that I have never flown Marauders on live server has been because they are not even as good as a standard battleship for pvp. Marauders should not only be pve boats but also good for pvp. The Navy and Pirate ships way outshine the Marauders.

Marauders should have standard battleship level sensor strength and scan resolution. They have three lovely utility slots in their highs that would be nice to fit battleship level mods in and that alone would make these ships much more powerful in pvp combat situations. They are still very expensive ships and so the risk of fielding one is very great but giving them enough grid to field any weapon system and utilities would entice pilots to bring them to the field of pvp.

Honestly I would also like to see more variety in all of the tech2 ship lines and would like to see more ships within a class ( ie. a second Marauder, BO, EAF, HIC for each race).

Reason sensor strength is low is to avoid exactly this. CCP does not want Marauders in PVP. Simple as that. In fact, it doesn't seem they want any T2 battleships to PVP. Including the Blops! xD

Not quite true, certainly they don't want Marauders to become soloPWNmobiles and that the intention would be that they be used for PvE - but I recall devs expressing not only surprise but also delight when they discovered that the Kronos in particular was being used in PvP (and IIRC at that time more heavily in PvP than in PvE).

Thoughts on rebalance, as a pilot who flew Marauders for a while, trained Marauders 5, etc:

-All Marauders get increased sensor strength and scan resolution. This is not only a balance issue but an immersion one, as I don't believe anyone, even the Minmatar, would want to create an advanced, upgraded version of a ship and stick sensors from an old broken-down pre-warp mining barge into it. Not to mention I don't see any reason that Marauders should not be more viable for PvP, even though they are intended as kings of PvE. CCP is trying to make PvE more like PvP anyway, so why not?

-All Marauders become better on-the-go-salvagers, via increased tractor range and better salvaging speed or chance of salvaging. Because I am *not* flying all the way over there --> to get in tractor range of that wreck when I could come back and tractor it in a noctis or ignore it entirely.

-All Marauders have their shield and/or armor resistances rebalanced.

-All Marauders get an extra 50 drone space and drone bandwidth.

-Vargur gets powergrid buff from 9875 to 12225. To fit a Vargur with even faction 1400mm Howitzer artillery at the moment requires way to many powergrid mods. You'd still need some with the extra 2500 powergrid but it would open up the 1400s as a more viable option.

-Golem gets either increased range, or a further bonus to damage. On other ships, you have to balance damage and damage projection, so I don't mind this being the case with the Golem, but the RNI should not be such a significantly better time investment than the Golem.

-Vargur gets a minor increase to speed and agility; certainly not as fast as the Machariel; as that is supposed to have all the old Jovian tech and whatnot, but at least enough to justify it as a Minmatar battleship. Kronos should get an increase to base speed or a bonus to MWD energy consumption as well.

-Kronos gets a 5% range bonus per level, or an extra lowslot, or an extra midslot. This would give it one extra slot over other Marauders, so the range bonus might be a good idea instead. Alternatively, a minor buff to railguns; as awesome as they already are; may clear up the issue. At the moment the only railgun ships I see regularly are rail Vindicators in Incursions - outside of that the weapon system seems as if it needs work.

-Golem moves a midslot to a lowslot.

-Paladin is a beast from a statistics standpoint but I have so little experience with it I'm worried about giving any specific advice. I think it would benefit from a powergrid buff to 17250 and a CPU buff to 700. I don't see any major issues with the slot layout or the damage/damage projection.

I think you covered what the Paladin needs with the resistance/armor rebalance suggestion. Tank and dps balancing is very difficult on this ship without t2 resists in terms of pvp, especially when the competitor ship is the Abaddon which outclasses it at the moment.