What I'm most interested in is the friggin' Hornet. It can carry three people, but is somehow equal to the Banshee? Sorry, but that sounds a little unbalanced to me.
Unbalanced? Apart from the fact that we have no idea really how it'll function, the Hornet isn't meant to be a counterbalance against the Banshee, but rather the counterbalance against another Hornet, on the opposite side of the map. Bungie doesn't parse vehicles across the UNSC/Covenant platforms for balancing purposes (like they do with weapons sometimes), but rather for fictional reasons. If we're playing multiplayer, Bungie will more than likely have identical vehicles for all teams.
After really using the Banshee, I've found it far from powerless in the beta (and I'm sure that was your experience as well Drew). The mixture of agility, alongside the newly implemented plasma mortar in multiplayer, really make the vehicle effective and fast, something I feel like the Hornet won't match overall.
I think we're getting a boost-less (relatively slow), primary-weapon only (no mortars) troop carrier that's reasonably swift and good at moving across the map, but no where near as agile or proficient as the Banshee is during aerial combat.