All things EVE

[Piperfan]

You currently have 10 skills and 56,098 skill points.

Gax Krykhal still exists. I don't even know what race he is. The game started me off from the beginning, but I am guessing the skill points are a bit more than the usual beginning character. I am now fairly far in to the tutorial, just finished the evemail system (FILLED with corp recruitments from Sept - Dec of 2003) and am starting the combat phase.

This may be a cool change of pace.

[WayAbvPar]

That is about double what I started with, skills wise. Don't forget to upgrade your clone if you haven't already- the first clone only covers 30k in skill.

[Piperfan]

Excellent advice. I would never have considered it myself but the computer does chime in as you approach 60K. For 4096 ISK I have a clone that is good until I hit 240,000 skill.

The longest tutorial ever was actually fun and I thought well done. I had forgotten about this game. I had real life jump on me with both feet two years ago and before I really got started on this I quit. I am glad everyone here created a buzz that got me to look again. It is hard to keep my interest anymore but I will see if this lasts more than a few months.

[Jamiko]

http://myeve.eve-online.com/news.asp?a=single&nid=1046&tid=1

Important Announcement
This morning we have been investigating a number of account hack attempts. 57 accounts were compromised and as a result, we started full investigation and lockdown procedures. This culminated in the lockdown of Tranquility during downtime until we had finished our investigation.

As a preventive measure, to ensure account security, we have reset passwords and will send out an email to selected accounts and ask them to change their passwords.

[WayAbvPar]

OK- n00b question regarding skills and training and such. In the official forums, the generally advocated scheme is to train learning skills first, then train other skills  at an advanced pace (due to the bonuses from the earlier learning). The progression looks like this -

Instant Recall I
Analytical Mind I
Learning I
Instant Recall II
Analytical Mind II
Learning II
Instant Recall III
Analytical Mind III
Learning III
Instant Recall IV
Analytical Mind IV
Learning IV
Instant Recall V
Eidetic Memory I
Eidetic Memory II
Eidetic Memory III
Eidetic Memory IV
Analytical Mind V
Logic I
Logic II
Logic III
Logic IV
Learning V
Iron Will I
Iron Will II
Iron Will III
Iron Will IV
Iron Will V
Spatial Awareness I
Spatial Awareness II
Spatial Awareness III
Spatial Awareness IV
Spatial Awareness V
Empathy I
Empathy II
Empathy III
Empathy IV
Focus I
Focus II
Focus III
Focus IV
Clarity I
Clarity II
Clarity III
Clarity IV

My confusion comes from the seemingly interchanging use of I and 1 to indicate a level. Are these steps talking about skill ranks or skill levels within a rank? For example, my current learning skills look like this-

Analytical Mind / Rank 1 / SP: 1415 of 8000
level 3
Instant Recall / Rank 1 / SP: 9816 of 45255
level 2
Iron Will / Rank 1 / SP: 3529 of 8000
level 3
Learning / Rank 1 / SP: 8000 of 45255
level 1
Spatial Awareness / Rank 1 / SP: 250 of 1415

If I were to follow the progression, do I take all 5 levels in rank 1 Instant Recall, or is each level a step along the way? I can't seem to find a suitable explanation on the forums.

I guess my basic question is this- is the difference between Instant Recall I and Instant Recall II 5 levels, or 1 level? Do skills go to Rank 2 (or II) after 5 levels?

Apologies if this is too n00b to believe. I am genuinely confused for some reason.

[Soln]

here's a noob question -- is there any limit on skills?  or is just a time sink? i.e. learn what you can in time available

[Raging Turtle]

Rank is independant of skill level; its just an indicator of 1x, 2x, or 3x learning time.  So a rank 1 skill might take 3 days to learn, a rank 2 will take 6 days. 

No limit on skills, as far as I know. 

[WayAbvPar]

Rank is independant of skill level; its just an indicator of 1x, 2x, or 3x learning time.  So a rank 1 skill might take 3 days to learn, a rank 2 will take 6 days.

Where do skill ranks come in then? Are rank 2 skills more effective? What causes a rank to go up (or down)?

[Wolf]

WayAbvPar - The difference between Instant Recall I and Instant Recall II is 1 level. Meaning to train from I to II you have to train just one skill. There is, however, a "tier 2" memory skill that's called "Eidetic Memory" that adds even more memory, but it requires Instant Recall V. The basic idea is - get your learning skills up, get some skills for whatever you want to do (eg - mining IV and Industrial IV if you want to mine for cash) than go on and train your tier 2 learning skills for your main profession of choise (continuing with the example - if you want to mine and produce, get your tier 2 Int and Mem skills up to level III). That's about the time I quit the game. I had my initial learning skills all set up, had a Dominix (Galente Drone-based Battleship) and was doing pretty well so I decided to start on my tier 2 learning skills. 2 weeks later I was bored out of my mind of mining, got cocky, went to a Security Level 5 complex and lost my battleship because I was greedy and tried to scoop up my drones while obviously dying... Finished my learning and canceled never to come back. The moral of the story is two-fold - never fly in something you can't afford to lose, EVEN if you are SURE NOTHING WRONG CAN HAPPEN and Always, and I can't stress enough, ALWAYS INSURE YOUR SHIP.

Soln - no limit to skill. IIRC the best clone you can get is for 20 mil skill points and there are people running around with 40, though.

edit: grumble, grumble I write too slow. Rank is a measure of a skill's "difficulty". More "advanced" skills take more time to train. For example Galente Frigate from level III to IV would take 30,000 skill points (you get a Xpoints/minute while training a skill) and Gallente Battleship from level III to IV would take 150,000 skill points (numbers are totally made up)

[tazelbain]

Wolf, is you avatar hitting on me?

[Merusk]

No limit on skills, other than you'll lose any skillpoints beyond your clone's level if (when) you're podded.   So there is a kind of 'cap' in that the most expensive clone right now hold 25.6 million skill points.  That's YEARS of skill training, though.

-Doh wolf postd this but he had the clone as smaller than it is so I'll post.

[WayAbvPar]

WayAbvPar - The difference between Instant Recall I and Instant Recall II is 1 level. Meaning to train from I to II you have to train just one skill.

So, if I were to compare my skills (listed previously) to the list of Learning Skills to learn, I could scratch off Analytical Mind I-III, Instant Recall I and II, Iron Will I-III, Learning I and Spatial Awareness I?

I think my confusion is stemming from the fact that I see Roman numerals in some places and Arabic numerals in others, and they SEEM to me talking about the same thing- is that correct?


Still don't understand what a Skill Rank means either.

[Wolf]

Yes and Yes. You'll get rank once you have to train a more advanced skill, it's nothing to be worried about - it's just an indication of how much time a skill would take to learn.

tazelbain - you wish. If ChineaseTvChick is hitting on anyone, that's me baby  :-D

[Piperfan]

Dude I hope you are not the jealous boyfriend type because that tramp is winking at all of us and I think that hand gesture she is making means "Two Dollar".

[Viin]

The rank of a skill does not change. It is set when the skill is created and *only* dictates how long it takes to train from one level to the next.

When they say 'Learning I' they mean level 1 of Learning. When they say 'Learning IV' they mean level 4 of Learning.

Ie: Train to Learning level 1, then train to Learning level 2, then train to Learning level 3, then train to Learning level 4. Now you are at Learning IV. It's not a new skill, it's the *level* you are at in that skill.

Ignore rank. All it tells you is that a skill with a rank of 2 is going to take twice as long to learn to the same level as a skill with rank 1. That's all and now I will go back to fucking my poodle. [jerk! you weren't suppose to tell anyone about my poodle fetish! - author]

[Reg]

Wayab, don't do anything crazy like taking your learning skills all up to 5 before you train anything else. The people on the forums that talk about doing that are usually talking about alt characters they have on second accounts. If you spend too much time on the learning skills you'll die of boredom long before the 2 week trial is up.

Just take them up to 2 or 3 and spend the rest of the time working on stuff that will let you fly better ships, do harder missions, and make more money.

[Uninformed]

Eidetic Memory is a costly skill to start - usually about 3 million ISK, although EVE Online's database says the base cost is 5 million.

IMHO it's better to train the Learning series of skills to level 4 (except for Empathy, which raises Charisma, unless you're gunning to become a top-dog trader early on), put the credits aside for a Destroyer or Cruiser, *then* save up for Eidetic Memory.

Edit: And then I read the rest of the thread and find out three people have said the same thing.  Argh, might as well make the best of this post.

Useful skills.

Engineering tree: Energy Grid Upgrades, Energy Systems Operation, Energy Management.  Gives you nice boosts in capacitor max and recharge.  Energy Management 4 is required for a handy gadget, the Micro Auxillary Power Core.

Navigation tree: Fuel Conservation, Acceleration Control, Evasive Maneuvering.  The first two are useful to pilots who use afterburners, which I imagine includes most anyway, and the last is good for all.

Gunnery tree: Rapid Firing, Motion Prediction, Sharpshooter.  Fire faster/hit fast targets easier/hit from further.  Surgical Strike is also a good combat skill, but one for later because it's relatively pricey.

Electronics tree: Long Range Targeting.

Mechanic tree: Hull Upgrades.  There's another nice gadget called Damage Control which gives bonuses against all damage types, only requires Level 1 in this skill, and should be quite affordable.

[Yoru]

I decided to do something silly tonight to poke fun at how serious the 0.0 people are about defending their territory.



Dear Zero Point Zero alliances,
 I'm in your base.
 I'm killing your 'roids.

18 units of obsidian ochre. Got chased across six systems on the way back to empire too. :)

[NiX]

Woot! We should do this some time. Really rile up them corps.

[Trippy]

I decided to do something silly tonight to poke fun at how serious the 0.0 people are about defending their territory.

Dear Zero Point Zero alliances,
 I'm in your base.
 I'm killing your 'roids.

18 units of obsidian ochre. Got chased across six systems on the way back to empire too. :)

Can you tow/push asteroids around? Or did they just happen to spawn in a cluster like that?

[Yoru]

Can you tow/push asteroids around? Or did they just happen to spawn in a cluster like that?

That's what the 'roid looks like, a kind of clump of hexagonal crystals. The ship is a tiny little frigate (a Condor).

Also, the damn rocks are spread out over 450 kilometers, check out the overview.

[Sky]

So when f13'ers start getting killed in low sec space by 0.0 alliances, we know who to thank? 

The future of this game is uncertain, the GAF dropped appreciably over the weekend. Trying to get into a cruiser and she noticed me starting Caldari Frigates V....17d....And you know...she's got a point. 17d, and that's only one of many, many skills. The early stuff wasn't bad, but it ramps up quick.

We'll see.

[Merusk]

The question, Sky, is why are you training Firgates V?  Nothing requires it, and that exra bonus isn't worth the time invested until you're much farther along the skill tree.  Those 17 days would be better served training-up your various shield, missile, gunnery, mechanic and engineering skills to level III right now.  Hell I'm doing Level 3 missions and I only have 1 level V skill. It's simply not necessary at this point.

[Reg]

Yeah I have no intention of doing frigate 5 until I make the push to get into advanced ships. Even now with over 6 million skill points total there are still a ton of important skills to get first. Flying a ship without the support skills needed to do it competently is just asking for disappointment.

[Sky]

Daddy wants a missile platform Cruiser. I thought Frigates V was a req? Yeah...I need to work a few shield skills, but I've got a solid core of missile and engineering skills already. I did learning and those, with a couple social for $$. I'm flying a Kestrel and intend on moving into a pure missile cruiser, so gunnery is less important...I'm specializing. I like missiles.

[Merusk]

Nope, the next tier of ship just requires IV of the tier before it.  So Cruisers require Frigs IV and Battleships require Cruisers IV.  If you're at IV you're good to start training-up cruisers.

Specializing..yeah I'm flying Minmatar, wish I could do that.  One thing to look at is the bonuses of the cruiser you're wanting to get into. Is it set-up to be an armor tank or a shield tank?  I'm having to learn all the shield skills because a Cyclone with armor tanking was viable back when I quit in August, so it was a good upgrade in-line with the skills I had for my Rifter and Rupture.  Then the RMR patch made it an awesome shield tank.. soooo.. yay for more skills to me.

[Sky]

My bad, you're right, I'm all set to learn Cruisers now. Woops.

Now to go make a couple mil... ;)

[Yoru]

My bad, you're right, I'm all set to learn Cruisers now. Woops.

Now to go make a couple mil... ;)

Get a Badger and come haul for one of the relatively-frequent mining hoedowns. We'll gather the minerals and build yer cruiser. :)

[Sky]

I DON'T NEED NO STEENKIN BADGER.

I mean...sounds good.

[WayAbvPar]

My bad, you're right, I'm all set to learn Cruisers now. Woops.

Now to go make a couple mil... ;)

Get a Badger and come haul for one of the relatively-frequent mining hoedowns. We'll gather the minerals and build yer cruiser. :)

What do I need to help out? Can I slap on a big mining laser onto my frigate and be of any help? I can train my mining skill up too if that is necessary...

[Viin]

Hauling is probably the thing we need the most. There's a few of us who can do Miner 2's which can pull in a lot of ore - it's just that it's a pain to stop and take a full can back to the station before mining more. If there are some haulers then we can do non-stop mining for an hour and get 2-3 times more resources.

But, it seems most of the mining is happening in space other than Caldari. Which is a huge pain when trying to drive an indie around, 'cause they are real slow. If we do mining in Caldari space I have a Badger 2 someone (or I) can use to haul.

[Yoru]

To seriously contribute to a mining op as a miner, you should be able to continuously run two Miner IIs, which can be done on a frigate; you'll need Mining 4 to fit those and a few levels of Electronics to get the CPU power; maybe Electronics Upgrades (or whatever the skill is) to fit some CPU Co-Processors to get those last few CPU points.

Above that is a mining cruiser, which can fit at least 3 Miner IIs; mining cruisers usually only require Cruiser 1, but they tend to get substantial bonuses to mining from additional points in Cruiser. The next steps above that are either a mining battleship (ridiculously expensive) or a mining barge (ridiculously skill-heavy), so ignore those until you know that you really really really really want to do a lot of mining.

The other way to contribute is by hauling the ore the miners are producing back to base. Hauling requires a cargo hauling ship and the Industrial skill (requires Frigate 3, Spaceship command 3). The entry-level Minmatar and Caldari industrials are good enough to keep up with 2-3 well-equipped miners; the entry-level Gallente one is a little too small and can just barely keep up with two well-equipped miners. I imagine the Mark 2 version (requires Industrial 2) would do just fine and the higher-ranked Gallente Industrials rapidly outstrip the cargo holds of the other races. Using instawarp bookmarks is really helpful, but how to set those up can be taught pretty quickly.

If you want to get into hauling, it costs about 750k for the skill and your entry-level ship; loans can be arranged if necessary.

The reason I've not been mining in Caldari space is that the surveying forays I've made up there have revealed a dire lack of good ore. Even in 0.5, the best rocks I've seen in Caldari space are pyroxeres and plagioclase, which are pretty much poor compared to what you can find elsewhere. Omber is the best high-sec ore I've been able to consistently find (mostly in Minmatar space), although profits can be made with kernite too (mostly in Ammatar/Amarr space). I have yet to check out Frenchy space. If someone can consistently find systems with multiple large fields (>10 rocks) of omber or extremely rich fields of kernite (>15 rocks) in Frenchy or Caldari space, I'd consider lugging my barge over there.

[Merusk]

You won't find a lot of good ore in high-sec space, if you find any at all.  CCP is very, very aggressive about pushing people out into low sec and beyond, they want their game to be primarily PVP with the safe areas just for noobs.  It's been frustrating them (from what I can tell) that 2/3 of their population insists on hanging-out in .5 or higher.

  As a result they've been slowly stripping any benifits out of high-sec space and moving them to low-sec.  In part because the server is just too crowded in some areas, and in part because they really really want to see people PVP. It started with moving level IV agents, has moved to ore and high-bounty pirates and  they're continuing on with agents in upcoming patches I believe I read.

 Yeah, go figure, a dev company reverse-carebearing their customers. It's bizarro.  Still, unless they do something like move ALL agents above L1 Q -5 out into lowsec, with no NPC rats that give bounties or drops, you're not going to see any significant movement.  They underestimate the power of the catass and IGE to resupply folks who don't want to move.

[Krakrok]

Wow. That sucked. IE just ate my huge post.


Summary:

Eve needs capturable ships (not just destroyable) to move people out into lowsec.

Eve needs the "bartender" suggestion mechanic from Pirates! to help newbies integrate into the game.

Eve feels pretty inhuman. Tie in more human elements.

[Yoru]

You won't find a lot of good ore in high-sec space, if you find any at all.  CCP is very, very aggressive about pushing people out into low sec and beyond, they want their game to be primarily PVP with the safe areas just for noobs.  It's been frustrating them (from what I can tell) that 2/3 of their population insists on hanging-out in .5 or higher.

I think a large part of the problem here is that as you approach 0.0 space, the quantity of skills and equipment required to maintain break-even cashflow rises sharply, and the ability to do things solo or in small groups drops sharply. These trends arise both from the increasingly hostile NPCs and the increasingly predatory PCs. Therefore, you not only need a couple months of skilling-up in the 'kiddie pen', but you also need to have at least a handful of friends who are similarly ready and equipped to take the plunge. (This is all presuming that everyone will tolerate PVP, which is a bad assumption in regards to the population at large, but a valid one since CCP intends this to be a PVP game.)

This certainly isn't helped by the xenophobic behavior of the 0.0 hegemonies. I was chased and shot at, unprovoked, three times in the little 0.0 jaunt pictured above.  A relative noob in an unarmed (save for the tech1 ECM that I couldn't activate) noob frigate in an unaligned noob-corp attacked once on entry of 0.0 space from lowsec, once in the middle of the journey across someone's claimed space, and once on the way out of 0.0 through lowsec. All three times involved alliances large enough for me to have heard of them before. I'm not saying I was looking for a parade with flowers at my feet, but at least being convo'ed and told to get the hell out would've been less hostile than being silently chased across the stars.

(I was expecting to get chased and shot at, that was kind of the whole idea of the journey, but I'm still a little shocked at their tenacity.)