Skill Discussions

Hey there fellow EVE players,

I'm new to the game and i finished the tutorial and realized literally how many skills there were in this game and it has really confused me. I am wanting to focus on missions but there is so much ship modules needed and so many skills needed for these modules.

I was just wondering if any of you have any tips for keeping more organised and on top of skills and also what my priorities should be.

Also i know this isn't really part of the skills section but can anyone help me deciding on different fittings and whcih modules to use as there are so many and i don't know the differences

Thanks all

1. Join EVE University
2. Take Classes
3. Study
4. There are threads and blog posts on player's blogs about basic skillsets (and there's at least one page on EVE University's Wiki discussing the same thing.
5. Check out the basic certifications in Core Competency, Defense, and Gunnery (for starters).
6. Don't neglect the relevant social skills. As for which ones are relevant, read the descriptions and ask questions if you need to.

open EFT
look for the module you need (don't get T2 module or ship)
open the game
see the prereq of the module
learn the skill

some skill are very good for fitting so you must get them ASAP (electronics, engineering, weapon upgrades, and adavanced weapon upgrades) the last one you can get later as you see fit

the other skills beside module or hull (mostly support skills), you must read them 1 by 1

Seriously, missions are not the reason this game is so good. Get down to lowsec and join a faction warfare corp. You will get trained properly and the isk is excellent, even if you decide to go solo.

Master T1 frigates first. The Gunnery or missile support skills (Trajectory Analysis, Motion Prediction etc) are at least as important as the damage skills since they define how well you apply that damage. Then navigation skills since much of PvP boils down to range control.

I'm guessing you were kidding with the part about buying every skill you can train?

I really did that as a noob and wasted a lot of training time. Sure I eventually used those skills but some not for over a year. I could have been training skills relevant to what I needed at the time.

I don't understand how this hasn't been posted before....

Download EvEMon.
Input your character's API.
Create a skill plan for your character.

Add to it skills you need for the ship and modules you wish to use. A good place to find those skills is to use EFT, fit up a ship how you want, and it will list the skills you need. I recommend battleclinic and corp mates to find good fits & setups on ship types.

Racial Frigate
Electronics
Engineering
Energy Management
Energy Systems Operation
Navigation
Connections
Weapon Upgrades
Advances Weapon Upgrades
Drones
Drone Interfacing

You want most of those trained to 5 real fast, but AWU, Connections and Drone Interfacing shouldn't be trained to more than 4 early on, except if you're Gallentean or if for some other reason you like drone-based ships a lot - then get Drone Interfacing to 5 soon. In the longer term you'll want DI and AWU trained to 5 regardless of race, but training Connections to higher than 4 is often not desirable.

Go to the newby forum. People there offer better links and have better new player skills. Trust me.

General Steps to skilling up for a new player:

1. Train Cybernetics and beg, borrow, or steal to get some decent implants (+2 or +3 at least). Tutorials give some.

2. Decide what type of weapons (hybrid, projectile, lasers, drones or missiles) best fit your play style.

The following comments are based more on my personal experience than hard numbers, and may not reflect some changes from the most recent expansions:

a. Hybrid: have a wide range of ammo types for various types of damage and range modifiers.
- Blasters for very short range, high damage, good tracking. Good early on, since most mission frigs/dest engage up close.
- Rail guns are medium to long range depending on ammo type, moderate to weak damage, crappy tracking. I prefer other weapon types for mid to long range (like lasers, but they use a lot of cap).

b. Projectile: Projectile ammo gives the best range of damage types of any turret ammo (imo).
- Autocannons are very short range, high damage, good tracking, no cap use. I love AC's so I'm very biased. They usually have good fall off, and aren't as short range as blasters.
- Artillery has good range and damage, but poor tracking and a very slow rate of fire; also no cap use.

c. Lasers: Laser ammo (crystals) are limited to EM/TH for damage types, offer a wide variety of ranges, and you can change or reload them instantly.
- Pulse lasers are good short - mid range, good damage, okay tracking, use a lot of cpu.
- Beam lasers are good at med-long range, moderate damage, and bleh tracking (but better than rails).

d. drones are pretty good on range and damage (with the right skills), but are subject to being targeted. They track pretty well, if you're using the right size drone for the target.

e. Missiles are more difficult to nail down as they aren't named the same at different class-sizes as turrets, and use different mechanics. They still follow the same general philosophy of high damage/short range, and long range/moderate damage.
- Rockets / Heavy Assault Launchers / Torpedoes: High rate of fire / high damage, short range. Torps are very short range if you don't have ship bonuses for them.
- Light missiles / Heavy Launchers / Cruise: Long range, slower RoF, and moderate damage.

Missiles don't use the tracking mechanic, which can be a nice benefit, but do still have a mechanic (explosion velocity) that makes them less effective on fast ships.

3. Decide what type of tank (armor, shield, speed) best fits your play style.

There are several tanking styles; active, passive, buffer, etc. Initially you won't need to worry about that, you just need the basic skills; Shield skills are under Engineering and Armor skills are under Mechanics (though this may change soon).

a. Armor; Most Gallente and Amarr ships, some Minmatar ships. Armor tanks trade off speed or cargo capacity, and frequently require a lot of power grid and capacitor. Armor will never repair itself passively.

b. Shield. Most Caldari ships, some Minmatar ships. Shields have a native recharge rate that is most efficient around 33%. You also gain efficiency in your recharge rate by adding shield hp, because the time your ship recharges its shield to 100% doesn't change when you add more hp. So, generically, if your shield of 1000 hp recharges in 60 seconds, and you add modules that increase it to 1500 hp, it still recharges in 60 seconds. Shield tanks usually increase your signature radius, making you a bigger target. Active shield tanks can be very cap heavy.

c. Speed. Minmatar are usually the fastest and most agile in their class, but any ship can be speed fit...basically sacrificing armor or shield for speed, making it difficult for anything to track or damage you effectively.

d. Dual-tanking: Not advised. I've seen a lot of noobie fits that have armor and shield mods. I'm not saying it can't be done, but its almost never efficient. Focus on shield or armor according to your ship's fitting slots and bonuses. More low slots, generally means an armor tank. More mid slots, generally means a shield tank. This is not universal, but a general rule.

4. Decide which race you want to fly initially (which may not be the race you started in) based on the kind of weapons and tank you're planning on using. You can always train skills for the other things later, but you should try to focus your training to start.

5. Train that race's frigates to 3, plus the basic weapon and tank skills according to your ship's bonuses. You'll move on to destroyers (small ships) in a week or two, cruisers (medium; 2-4 weeks), battlecruisers (medium; 2-3 months), and battleships (large; 3-5 months). You'll have to train the next class-size of weapons as you upgrade to bigger ships.

6. Train all skills with the word "upgrade" (Hull Upgrades, Weapon Upgrades, Electronics Upgrades, Shield Upgrades, etc.) in its name to level 3-4. This will cover a large number of basic modules to T2. These are usually pretty cheap and fast to train. You'll also want some basic propulsion skills for afterburners (preferred for missions) and microwarpdrives (though these are not functional in most missions).

7. Look at the Core Fitting certificates and work on those, as they will apply to every ship you fly.

8. Use EFT for specific ship fittings and Eve Mon to organize and plan your skills.

I like cap stability and a solid tank for PVE. You should be able to solo level 4 missions with relative ease within 6 months.



Obviously Eve is a game that offers a lot of options, so I've tried to put this in general terms. There are a lot of ways to fit ships and engage in combat, so I tried not to be too specific here.


My two ISK,
-Dargon

Louis's epic guide is definite place to start. And join a Corp