The cap table tells you who else thinks the company is worth something at that stage. It can be a great indication not of like future dilution, but of who else is on board.
If you take the lotto ticket perspective, you should do everything you can to maximize your odds and part of that is doing as much diligence as you can on the company.
If I were joining as a first/early engineer, or at a senior level - particularly early stage - I'd want to see the cap table.
But then all you care about is the names, not the $ figures they’ve invested and the % they received, is that right? If you assume that any deal with some VC entails a certain $ amount minimum of interest, why don’t I just show you the press release of who’s invested then?
I think that's fair, yeah. There's some value especially early on in terms of feeling trusted by your new coworkers, etc, but the bulk of it IMO comes from the names.
If you take the lotto ticket perspective, you should do everything you can to maximize your odds and part of that is doing as much diligence as you can on the company.
If I were joining as a first/early engineer, or at a senior level - particularly early stage - I'd want to see the cap table.