What do I mean? Well, if you're working for a faction, you get several 'core' variants of different Mechs available. As you fight, you build up salvage and reputation with that faction. To unlock variants, you either spend salvage to build that mech, or spend reputation with a faction to purchase that mech - not every faction could sell every variant, and the mechs available would depend on whatever planets you had been to recently.
Salvage could be separated by chassis. Reputation could spent with the main faction, or you could trade it on the "black market" to unlock variants at a higher cost in reputation - but these variants would change over time and be partially randomized. Mercenaries and Lone Wolves would have some small discounts on the black market, but more importantly they could earn reputation easily from different factions without having to resort to desertion/switching teams (which should incur a large penalty to the reputation for that faction).
Eventually, Clans would go through the same treatment. However, right now there aren't enough Clan variants to make it workable. Omnipods would have to be treated much the same, since they largely make variants obsolete.
Edited by Xarian, 11 September 2014 - 07:18 AM.