The AAR (damnit)
I had an identical reaction. Those poor FCs
Well, I don't write AARs anymore. When we do them, it's done tribunal style on teamspeak. But I know of an alliance that will probably be a little annoyed by this "new" acronym...
Oh, and
speculation in my circles about the new hulls has been something like this:
Gnosis = 10yr anniversary gift. Rarity will mean it will not have any impact on the current fleet meta. Alternatively, it could become an LP reward for SOCT LP, or BPCs will drop from a new round of SOCT exploration sites. If we think about Vigilant and Cynabal prices, and then apply a proportional cruiser -> faction cruiser mark-up, you could guess the Gnosis market value to potentially exceed a billion ISK, or on the conservative side to be worth something between that of a pirate cruiser and a pirate BS, so 300mil-1.3bil.
Even if it had the exact same drop rate and/or LP exchange rate as a pirate cruiser, it'd still be about 30mil more expensive mineral-wise, so it would be competing with things like the Sleipnir (260mil) and the Loki (400mil) with at least a 350mil price tag.
I would consider either of the existing alternatives to be more effective at most tasks than the Gnosis, at the only expense of being less versatile.
Does not strike me as a balance killer or even a meta-changer if these price estimations are at all accurate.
My favorite theory on the pirate rookie ships is that CCP will be releasing the option to begin your career in NPC null-sec, but I kinda doubt that.
I think it's more likely that they will add 4 new low-sec epic arcs (or maybe just 1 with 4 branches) and introduce them to new players at the same stage as they are presently introduced to the Sister's arc, and they'd be designed around a similar but somewhat more rookie friendly principle as the existing pirate arcs, meaning that they can be completed in a PVP-ready or at least MWD fit.
Another possibility is that they hope to either introduce something like pirate militias, or PVP-geared live events, or different rookie ships depending on the faction affiliation of the station that issues the ship. This would at least cure the silly little problem that somehow Amarr Navy stations have an unlimited supply of Reapers for me.