The Calibration screen at Level 5 (and every re-calibration after it) shows your own drone, three times over — one card per class, everything visible at once, nothing behind a hover. Each card carries a bar chart of exactly what changes, ups and downs both, the class's three skills as their real glyphs with one line each, and a "plays like" sentence for what a run actually feels like.
Hauler: cargo capacity +30% and crystal yield +15%, against 18% less speed and creatures noticing the hull from 35% further away — he's loud. Scout: 18% more speed, 15% more light, and creatures tolerating a 30% closer or faster approach before reacting, against 25% less cargo capacity. Salvager: 40 more world-px of cover-opening reach and +3 Luck, against 15 less hull integrity and a Charge cell that refills a full unit per second slower.
None of it can be bought away to parity. Speed and cargo capacity are the only two of these numbers a Pearl can also touch, and the class shift is a permanent multiplier over the whole stack — an equally-geared Hauler is exactly as much slower than an equally-geared Scout as a stock one is, no matter how much either one carries. The other four numbers have no Pearl at any tier today, so those weaknesses can't be patched at all.
And nothing about any of this strands what you've already earned: gear and Pearls were never class-locked to begin with, each class keeps its own skill mastery the moment you fly back into it, and the first choice is still free — a later switch costs a modest, always-shown crystal fee, said out loud on the screen itself before you commit.