Just Started this...

[Soupytwist]

Started playing this on a trial account over the weekend with my flatmate.
I'm quite happy to read and learn as I play, but from some people in the know what is the best way to get most out of the game, as a beginner? By that I mean this is clearly a game that is at it's most interesting being part of a corp/guild - so how as beginner do we go about making sure we at least try to get into a decent player corp that'll help us (with advice, hints and tips) and do stuff together.

I generally get the feeling being in a good corp is the lifeblood of this game, so any suggestions welcome!

Cheers.

 

[Artanix]

man, where to start!? I played the game on and off for about 5/6 years, so things might've changed.

First thing to realise massively is, this isn't WoW... its ruthless. If you get blown up, your ship is gone. you don't get it back, you don't get the modules back, etc. You can insure the ship, but at best, its worth about 50% of your build.

Also, corps are important, but not neccessary, you can have fun on your own, but if you want to get out into 0.0 space, you'll need a corp, and an alliance most likely.

Eve-mon, its an amazing app, which links to your EVE API (if you don't know about this, just say ) it allows you to plan your skills, which you'll need to do.

So, heres a few questions for you first

1. what do you plan to do? pirate, trade, mining? get into 0.0 with a corp? missions? wormholes? the most common starts are mission's/mining, i get bored of them fast, but for a new starter you'll need to do them for at least a while.

2. Where do you want to be in a few months from now? to get into 0.0 corps you need to be able to use at least a battleship, and depending on where you go, you'll need voice comms and to help out with defence of those area's... granted some alliance/corps are hotter on this than others, I was with 3-I up in the north (Mostly Harmless/NC alliance) and yeah, things were pretty hot up there.


Its up to you really though, EVE can take as much time as you want it to, i know people who live in the game, building ships, moving them with carriers/jump freighters, and going out fighting at night time.

The game is so vast and varied, its hard to give you advice without knowing what you want to do I spent most of my time in 0.0 space, and so I can help you loads if you ever go there.

Oh, massive tip though, don't get involved in pirating just yet, don't shoot anybody in space, even if you go into anything 0.1 and above by accident, concord wont like you and gate guns wont like you either. You wont beat concord, ever.

If you go to the system map (F10) i think, make sure your autopilot settings are not allowing you to go through systems in 0.4 or lower space. These are basically PK zone's, and the zones where it changes from safe 0.5 space to 0.4 space are usually camped by pirates waiting for unfortunate people to make the mistake of thinking they can get through. Don't ever make a risk unless you can afford to lose your ship

hmm, thats about it for now i think, oh and on the subject of autopilot, only use it if you have to. Manually you can warp to 0km from a gate, autopilot can only do 15km, so you have to wait for it to fly to the gates, manually is nearly twice as fast in a fat slow ship

 

[Soupytwist]

I downloaded Evemon over the weekend after starting up the account, although i'm completely new to the game I did do a fair bit of reading up on it before starting the account, so I have a grasp of the basics. We spent the weekend running all the tutorials and getting to grips with the interface and feel of the game.

I know the basic starting idea is to get the learning skills up as quickly as possible, which I have being doing - although not exclusively. I'm in the process of learning the skills required plus recommended from Evemon to fly a combat Cruiser to run missions in, plus i've learnt Salvaging to make some cash. At some point early on I intend to learn some of the social skills to increase the rewards/rep from the missions - so basically i'm going to be a mission runner for a while. Long term I have no idea right now though!
My flatmate is thinking of going into the exploration side with manufactoring, but really i'm sure our 'plans' will evolve as we see more of the game!

Yeah discovered the manually warping to the gates is much quicker than the autopilot!!

One thing that's causing me the most problems right now is the overview and all it's setting - i'm never entirely sure how much info I need to see, i've taken asteriods out because i'm not interested in mining - but a few missions i've missed the 'key quest point object' because I wasn't set to show up on my overview.
Is it just trial and error on what to have showing, or is it best to have multiple setups for various situations?

 

[Artanix]

Yeah, get those learning skills up as soon as you can, i know its drastic, but Evemon will can show you the benefits, get all the basic skills up to level 5, and then the better ones to level 4 (when you can afford to), they will provide massive benefits in the long run.

Hmm, i used to have more overview settings that i really needed, but i'd setup 3 for you, 1 with gates and bases (nothing else), 1 for missions, 1 for missions+wreck's (for cleaning up at the end), and maybe some sort of emergency one with everything enabled incase you miss something. Its trial and error to be honest with the settings, just have a mess around.

Manufacturing is a long term thing, its not even worth attempting without production efficiency at lvl 5 (i think that was the skill), in Empire space, the margin for profit is so slight that you'll barely make money. On region borders you might be able to get a profit, but its very situational and you'd have to be very active 0.0 trading is another game altogether ) Anything else, let me know but mission running, just get your weapon skills up!! don't go for that big shiny ship, as the missions limit what ships can go in, a well skilled frigate pilot can take out a poorly skilled Battleship pilot anytime, and i'm not even joking What race are you playing anyway?

 

[Soupytwist]

I'm playing as Caldari and my mate is Galanty (or however it's spelt).
I've just got the caracal cruiser ship, which i'm hopefully going to stick with for a while and try and get it fitted out with tier 2 equipment when I get the money and skills!
Thanks for the overview tips, i'll have alook tonight.

 

[Artanix]

Caldari = easy mode for missions

with gun's/lasers you have to worry about signature radious, optimal ranges, etc.

Caldari, you just load missiles and fire, don't worry about range or any of that crap.

I wouldn't worry too much about all T2 stuff, such as missile T2 stuff takes a while. I'd say get the quick T2 stuff, like power diagnostics units, and BCU's (ballistic control units).

If you're doing missions for a while (once your standings get up, L3 agents can pay quite well), make sure you find out what your up against. Different enemies have specific weaknesses, and each region generally offers the same enemy in missions. Most of my missions were against Gurista's, and so they were weak against Kinetic, so i'd use kinetic based missiles.

Also ships wise, the best for missions are in this order:

Frigate - (can't remember, i don't think it matters)
Cruiser - Caracel
Battlecruise - Drake
Battleship - Raven *ugh*

Raven is the most popular battleship by miles, and they're generally shunted, but it'll get you by. Just remember the Drake is better defence-wise...infact the Drake has such a good tank, I used to use it in PVP over the raven. Its DPS output is a bit crap though. Once you get mega-monies, you can grab a nighthawk and be all pimp. I can tank a 3 Battleship spawn without dropping below 90% in that think.

 

[Cullhaven]

[Caracal, 1]
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II

10MN Afterburner II
Invulnerability Field II
Medium Shield Extender II
Large Shield Extender II
Large Shield Extender II

Assault Missile Launcher II, Sabretooth Light Missile
Assault Missile Launcher II, Sabretooth Light Missile
Assault Missile Launcher II, Sabretooth Light Missile
Assault Missile Launcher II, Sabretooth Light Missile
Assault Missile Launcher II, Sabretooth Light Missile

Althorn gave me this fitting for cara and I found that it was very good for missions.

 

[Soupytwist]

Cheers. I've got a similar setup to that albeit tier 1 versions.
Hit the first snag with the Assault Missile Launchers doing barely any damage to Frigates and Drones - which was annoying as they tend to be what I face most at the minute. So i've gone back to light missile launchers!

 

[Cullhaven]

Are you looking to see what missiles do the most damage on the mission type your on?

Mission reports

damage types

I found those 2 links useful

Damn Im getting a hankering to play again. Loved days spent mining while long term skills trained.

 

[Taians]

eve, shoot pubbies everyday

 

[Artanix]

yeah assault missile launchers suffer on the small ships, and a bit pointless due to their range nowadays. Maybe get some drones? they make short work of frig's. If you do go down the drone route, don't let them out until all ships in the overview are firing on your (red flashing crosshair against their name), then they wont change target and shoot your drones.

I'd drop you my stuff tbh, i don't want to play it again, i quit about a year ago, and must have about 1 bill worth of assests and isk floating around pureblind / empire space lol

 

[Soupytwist]

Wow that's a really generous offer, and more than a little tempting. But I think if I had all that money on such a new account i'd probably lose interest as all the missions/mining and ways of making money at this early in the game would be completely insignicant - and I'd still be hold prisoner by my skill limits.

So really thank you so much for the kind offer, but I'll decline. Couldn't you sell your account for some decent cash if you really aren't going to touch it again?

Cheers.

 

[Artanix]

i'd have to re-activate it again, and get all my assets in 1 place, since whoever buys the account isn't going to be able to undock without getting blown up by whoever owns the space there. I guess I could sell it, but its a fair amount of hassle

I'm almost certain it breaks CCP's EULA by selling accounts for money, (not that it doesn't happen anyway).

 

[Taians]

Pure blind? I can get your stuff out

 

[Soupytwist]

i'd have to re-activate it again, and get all my assets in 1 place, since whoever buys the account isn't going to be able to undock without getting blown up by whoever owns the space there. I guess I could sell it, but its a fair amount of hassle

Lol. I just finished my 14 day trial and activated my account - i've now reached the point where I realise I should have taken you up on your offer (jk). Finished up the Sisters of Eve arc on my final few hours of the trial now i've got a proper account hoping to find a good corp to join!

 

[Cullhaven]

you will start to make decent money on level II and III missions.

/edit Relatively decent money compared to now, not compared to the billions per second Tai and Req can make though

 

[Artanix]

yeah, for the billions you need to make big investments, and the isk printers have gone now (like a T2 Drone BPO), you can only make BPC's, although T2 BPO's are still in circulation... they cost a few bill just to get.

Get a good few hundred million together however you want (over time), and then think about looking to invest in something, 2 really good ways of making money are production and trading.

Both will make you money while you're offline, hence their massive benefit. I used to have a few alts around, one in oursuleart (i think thats the system name) and jita, literally stick up some cheap buy orders, and then put up sell orders at 20%. Money made without even logging in, granted you can't do this in jita anymore, the market shifts waayyyy too fast.

 

[Soupytwist]

Run out of 100% XP newbie skill learning boost, let the grinding begin!
Been running level 2 missions for a while now and managed to get upto an agent with a 17 standing, hoping to get a Drake in the next month - all my skills are going into that.
Lost my first ship last night, got cocky in a mission and didn't give myself enough time to warp away - Boom. Costly mistake !

 

[Artanix]

well got another tip for you on that If you feel things "could" get a bit too hot, align your ship to whatever you want to warp away to, for ease lets say a gate, now, the old way of doing this would be to warp to the gate, but cancel it just before you fly off, or double click just above the square for the selected gate, so when you do need to warp, it happens straight away.

Nowadays, I believe theres an option on the right click menu saying "align to", if you're at full speed and aligned correctly, you'll warp instantly, no more lost ships! In L3's and above, watch out for jamming ships (ECM, warp, etc.) they'll bring up a little icon in your overview, warp jammers are a right pain, since they're usually frigates.

As for the drake, go for PASSIVE shield skills, that thing can tank all day once you get a good setup on it, I seem to remember my setup using alot of SPR's which take away from your cap, but since its passive, cap doesn't matter

ship setups by the way: http://www.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadid=548883

 

[Requiel]

Yeah, be aligned to any celestial and you'll be able to GTFO if things get too hot. Also kill the elite frigates first because they are the ones that will tackle you.

If you want to PvP I suggest finding a good corp as soon as possible while it's still easy for you to move.