Originally Posted by ringring
I don't quite get what you're saying tbh.
Put it context of the Ps2 Lightning...
we have the vanilla lightning - deals some armour and infantry damage
we have the AA Lighning - little to no amrour/infantry damage but high damage against Aircraft
The Anti-tank Lightning - Little to no damage abaist Aircraft/infantry but high against armour
How does that customisation fit in with what you're saying?
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See, that's the problem, you think in damage dealing.
But you ignore the frame design (hull).
EDIT:
Another thing is visual qualities regarding use. These are called "use cues" in ergonomics design. These are there to indicate how something is used and encourage intuitive use from the first moment you lay eyes on it. If you take PlanetSide 1 and use cues, then those would be both embedded and external.
The embedded use cues are things like a visual spawntube and an equipment terminal visualy built into the AMS design and the difference in stance between undeployed and deployed state. In fact even the visual transition of state 1 (undeployed) to state 2 (deployed) where the equipterms are being lowered is a visual use cue: you know exactly when you can use it when you can't and what it is for.
The external use cues would be the yellow emblems on the ground that indicate you can perform a certain kind of action there. In combat, use cues would be things like tracers, reticules, health bars, shields lighting up due to being hit, the yellow ball in PS1 that registers hits for you, etc: it gives you information on what you do in relation to the "product".
A lot of vehicles in PS2 don't seem to have proper visual use cues, because the basic design (unit profile) between roles does not really change and isn't designed around every single purpose of that unit. This too makes unit identification harder for enemies. At a distance you may see a Lightning because you recognise the hull. But you have no idea what type it is till you get closer, which, with the different skins, can cause a lot of friendly fire. ES units are more than "cool", they're useful friend or foe identification features.
You could make a tank destroyer out of a tank, but if you keep the same basic profile with a turret, it still looks like a tank and it's not very suited to a tank destroyer (whose benefit is usualy a lowered profile and strengthened frontal hull). If you use the same chassis, it's not evident. PS2 does do something like this with subtle changes to the vehicle with armour and mobility sidegrades (see Magrider comparison shots), but it doesn't do so between fundamentally different vehicle roles aside from a slightly different turret or gun. Furthermore, with the same hull, armour values, speed and hitpoints are expected to be in the same domain range. There won't be extremely different qualities to these units.
While if you take the Sunderer and Deliverer, they can have extremely different qualities, despite being in the same unit category. Why? Because the platform itself (the basic frame) is different.