Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-23972736-20170910230649/@comment-454133-20170911033456

There's a lot, and I do mean a *lot*, of crossover. But in general:

Rebel like to field tough, durable ships with good or great attack power, and a number of support abilities.

Empire likes to field mobile, agile ships (previously with low attack and low cost, but more frequently lately, with higher cost and great attack power).

Scum is a jumble of everything in various mixtures: mobile and/or high attack power and/or durable and/or agile and/or all the things. And just for fun, when the devs made the Jumpmaster they just said "screw it, let's just make it good at everything", and their boss said "lol, that'll be good for the game!". And instead of leaving it as a joke, they actually did it. ;)

But seriously, there's so much bleed between factions... find ships, pilots, or fleet ideas that excite you, and pick the faction that has the most of those. You can also use Vassal to try out ships you don't own and figure out if you like them.