Let Y-8 Graduate to Gunship

Let Y-8 Graduate to Gunship
This idea/suggestion is Open. You can respond to ask questions or discuss the idea and either vote it up or down if you believe it should or should not be implemented, respectively. Popular suggestions and ideas will be considered by the development team to become reality in-game.
Proposal
I propose that the Y-8 Mining Ship, known and being infamous for being a cheap POB ship, be graduated to a full on Gunship.
Justification
The Y-8 Mining Ship has a mass of 5 million, Pilot operated guns, Crew operated guns, TWO Co-pilot seats, and Multiple floors require elevator usage. It is all but mechanically already a budget Gunship. It has a massive hitbox, flies like a space truck (Because it is), and still is unable to use Gunship equipment such as shield/armor/capacitors. The Ship itself is a poor POB in any form of PVP and is certainly outclassed by Gunships even if it should be upgraded.

It is, however, a good starter Gunship for groups of friends or people working on duty grinds for better Gunship schematics and decently expensive to kit out. This would also, thanks to needing Gunship parts, increase sales of those particular parts for Shipwrights as a general plus. POB Parts would take less of a hit since POB Weapons and Engines already go into Gunships.
Motivation
My motivation is to increase the usage and prevalence of a ship that is often underused and underappreciated. Increase the sales and appreciation of Gunship Parts. Increase the ease of Poors and people new to space to get into space with budget options earned through quests. One of my earliest SWG Memories was being dragged along in a POB which truly sparked my intense love for the game, and a proper Gunship for a full group of friends would be amazing to see in use. As it sits, it is outclassed by POBS -and- Gunships as its array of guns is harder to keep up at a high overload with only a POB Capacitor. It is, reiterating, a huge target requiring better shields that only the smaller Gunships have. It desperately needs love as a vessel and I hope to convince the player base of its' usefulness as a Gunship Over POB.
The Y-8 is less efficient at mining than a starship, a less efficient POB, and has the potential to be a Decent (Even if outclassed) Gunship. Let it at the very least be more useful. Yes it functions, yes with a crew it can mine just fine, but as a POB it is simply some weirdly lacking in-between of a true POB and Gunship.
 
I have long supported allowing Y-8 ships to use gunship parts. They are in a terrible place right now, they are not good mining ships and they are not good pobs. Their turret placements are near useless. Giving them gunship parts would still not make them good at either, but they would atleast be less terrible.
 
Upvoted.
My only suggestion would be that the mass may need to be adjusted down. Gunships have 3 mill mass (or they could if Resto changed caps). 5 mill mass on a Y8 means you load it with anything, no worries, where gunships you do have to make choices to outfit it. So I'd suggest 3 mill mass for a Y8.
Even if we left it at 5 mill mass, it's still a good idea.
 
I'm not going to upvote but I won't downvote, either.

Giving the Y8 gunship cert is like putting a cherry on a turd. You can give it GS parts but it'll never be as good. So while you're right that there won't be any power creep or imbalances, I also dislike change for the sake of change. Modifying a chassis to make it "the worst" to "the worst but different" is an exercise in futility.

In fact, you're right. The Y8 is trash. This proposed change is shortsighted, however. This might make it harder to propose any meaningful changes to the Y8 *later*. Once a change like this goes through it is difficult to reverse it. People might be disinclined to agree to further changes if this one passes.

It also makes Mining Grade parts pretty useless, moreso than they already are.

Do I think meaningful changes are coming to the Y8? No. That's why I'm not downvoting, because I cannot see anything on the horizon.

All in all this is a lateral move that would make a handful of people happy in the short term for a short period while *potentially* blocking further changes down the road.
 
I'm not going to upvote but I won't downvote, either.

Giving the Y8 gunship cert is like putting a cherry on a turd. You can give it GS parts but it'll never be as good. So while you're right that there won't be any power creep or imbalances, I also dislike change for the sake of change. Modifying a chassis to make it "the worst" to "the worst but different" is an exercise in futility.

In fact, you're right. The Y8 is trash. This proposed change is shortsighted, however. This might make it harder to propose any meaningful changes to the Y8 *later*. Once a change like this goes through it is difficult to reverse it. People might be disinclined to agree to further changes if this one passes.

It also makes Mining Grade parts pretty useless, moreso than they already are.

Do I think meaningful changes are coming to the Y8? No. That's why I'm not downvoting, because I cannot see anything on the horizon.

All in all this is a lateral move that would make a handful of people happy in the short term for a short period while *potentially* blocking further changes down the road.
Completely understood in your input and I appreciate it. In my. Own perspective I am hoping a minor change like this would at the very least make the y8 usable as opposed to useless, and while it needs more than what I suggested such as unflinching the bottom turret or atleast improving placement on the front turrets I believe increasing the use of the y8 will reinvigorate the need for more indeptg changes down the line than hinder it. With people willing to give it more a chance it grants awareness and thus priority. In my own eyes atleast.
Regardless, thank you for the input as I feel people needed some potential cons in the mix of the positivity. Fortunately, it may just be that. Potential cons with guaranteed pros with potentially more pros. Let's both hope regardless of this pv it gets attention.