Why is META such a disagreement?

[KickingJoub]

I think that, within reason, as many shapes/designs(Star Destroyer, Giant Isanth, Borg Cube, Nadesico, Enterprise) of ship as possible should have an insignificant difference in effectiveness. This is a difficult goal to achieve, especially whilst also making interesting building mechanics.
Internal space for RP rooms without significant deficits in efficiency is even more difficult to achieve.

I take it you mean as many shapes/designs with similar resource cost, as that seems like the only really effective balancing metric, at least to me.
But yes, it clearly is difficult to balance things, based on how long it's been attempted in Starmade at least. The "interesting building mechanics" is quite an important thing too, as I figure it's the part of what keeps people playing.

I bring up resource cost rather than size/shape/anything else intangible and hard to measure, because if two things cost equally, and one is designed more effective for one purpose, then surely they shouldn't be equal in it? A hammer and a knife can cost the same, but I wouldn't eat steak with a hammer. But I wouldn't hammer a nail with a knife. Yet, again to drag in the power update for a moment here, it seems those using knives are being forced to use hammers instead, and vice versa. I'd go so far as to say that a lot of updates have been in the same vein over the years.