EVE New Citizens Q&A

I love Eve, my friends do not, and yet I can't defend the game. They are right about every reason they stopped playing. My game group of 6 joined last month. I am the last one playing. Though I am playing more for the genre than the mechanics.

Eve's problem is that you don't get what you pay for. You get the game experience someone else paid for.

This is not a sand box game where you find your fun and play your way. You PvP. No matter what you PvP, b/c the PvPers are looking for you to play with. If you stay in Hi Sec to trade, mine, or explore, you still PvP b/c there are no instances, and you can still be the target of a suicide PvPer.

This isn't a problem for risk or loss in game, this a disruption of someone's real life time. If you're a career professional there is no jumping on for that quick leisure time to do that one thing you really like doing. You may spend an hour just finding that thing, another hour avoiding other players, still get whacked and start all over again. There is no jumping on before you have to pick the kids up from practice. This is a game for hard core players.

And they love it. That's why you see so many snide remarks in any post having any complaint about Eve. It's unfortunate so many react such a way. If you check the archives you will see a back log of forum posts by players who couldn't have the fun they paid for. They aren't telling others how to have fun, or trying to take the hardcore's fun away, they are mature people pointing out they paid for fun and aren't getting it. Adults should be able to accommodate others. But in post after post these players where run off by but Eve is supposed be hard.

Yes it is. And that's not what people complain about. They complain about the lack of fun. Or better the disruption of fun. Hard can be fun. No fun is a waste of time.

I do not mind pew pew PvP, and rather enjoy avoiding other ships while exploring, what I do not have fun with, is wasting so much time warping through systems b/c the fun I'm looking for isn't present. So I have had my frustrating moments in Eve. And no this is not a badge of honor. This is pointless and in those moments I am not getting what I paid for. I don't have much leisure time and my time is valuable. I see why more than 50% of players who try Eve leave. I like the space genre so much that it's not scaring me away though. Eve has a monopoly on open world space travel so at the moment they aren't worried about customers getting what they paid for.

I own a business. This is bad business, but should be expected from a company that doesn't have a customer service phone number. Pet Peeve of mine, never trust a business that doesn't have more than automated customer service, but again Eve has the monopoly on best Space game so I ignored it.

Tips to deal with this:
Know that this is not a game for most players, it's a 2nd life sim. They work at it, and don't care if it's not fun. They will have no sympathy for this, and probably not even understand what your complaint is.

Most work at it, b/c you can pay in game money to keep playing, called Plexing and this provides a sense of achievement.

Do not Plex this is a waste of time and you will have more fun if you don't. Your real life time has an opportunity cost. Even if you earn minimum wage you can pay for this hobby off of 3 hours a month after taxes. In game time to earn the isk would take more than this.

You are always PvPing. This game is heavily favored towards PvP. You can PvP without mining, exploring, ratting, mission running, or hauling. You can not do any of those things with out PvPing. And you compete with other players for PVE sites.

The weekends are for PvP. If you have plans on anything else, forget it. There will be too many people on trying to PvP you.

The sooner you become a PvPer the more often you will get what you are paying for.

This game is P2W. You skill up by having time in game and time in game cost money. Most players will deny this b/c it hurts their sense of achievement. SPs don't mean everything, but they mean a whole hell of a lot if the thing you want to do isn't available to you until you pay over $100 in sub fees for the privilege of getting the part of the game you wanted. The P2W isn't really a big deal but shouldn't be hidden the way it is. The real time skill system is only a money ploy.

This game is like playing catch with your son and the NY Giant's defense shows up b/c you picked up a ball.

Try to have fun!

My biggest kills have both been solo kills against players with a LOT more skillpoints than me, and a lot more resources than me (one had 50 billion in their wallet back when all my assets were worth maybe 10). So that garbage about being hopelessly behind unless you've played years is just wrong.

Not to mention the fact that the most fun two fights I have ever had were fights I lost. One of them was my second most expensive loss ever. Losing a ship to unplanned PVP is what makes the game so tense - and so fun - when not much is going on.

I dont think you're explaining the problem of EVE for n00bs as a n00b

The "problem" (if it should be called that) is this:

EVE is a multiplayer sandbox. You can do what you want by creating what you want. But so can others. You don't choose to singleplayer or multiplayer. If you like that concept, EVE rules.

My stuff was stolen from me 2 hours after starting to play this game. My first ship lured into an ambush and destroyed within the day. I started with 500K SP and 0 isk and ended with pretty much the same.

I'm sure most people who began playing this game and likes it, was confronted with the "multiplayer part" from the start.

So your statement that people don't get what they pay for is an outright lie.

You may not get what you paid for. Your friends obviously didn't. That's fine. You should not pay for what you don't want. But this unique game where kids are confronted with the fact that not everybody is your friend is EXACTLY what I paid for. Doing what I want despite you trying to stop me.

This shouldn't been posted in New Citizens Q&A. All the OP did was state their opinion. It just so happens that I enjoy the game because of the reasons he dislikes the game.

Because of that, it's hard for me to treat the post as "information" even if it is genuine.

Technically, maybe not.

But the 'no trolling' rule of Q&A resulted, so far, in some of the most thoughtful and intelligent posts I've ever read on EVE gameplay.

Though usually a passionate defender of EVE gameplay myself, I can't really find anything better to add to the above excellent replies.


Except maybe: OP, if you do like EVE, stick around and at least try a few more of the infinite gameplay options this great game offers you. Better done together with more experienced players that can show you the way.

If this is your first character, I assure you there is absolutely NO way that you can have an informed opinion of the game in less than a month.

Also, OP, I suggest that you prepare yourself for PvP. The omens point to a wardec coming your way in the near future. Like sometime around when I get home from work tonight.

Any game that tries to please everyone, pleases no one.

yes, EVE isn't for everyone - and that is a good thing.

For those that understand it and like it - they have a game of their own in a pool of sub-par theme-park-clone MMOs.

I think you get exactly what you pay for, you get eve. The problems start when people expect eve to be something that it isn't.

The sad truth of eve is that the actual chance of pvp is greatly overstated. In low and null you have to work for your pvp and even then you can go many days without seeing another soul. In empire, with the exception of suicide ganking all pvp is consensual (for the uninitiated war decs are easily avoided). Suicide ganking, while it gets a lot of buzz, is actually a rare event when you consider the entire population of empire. Its easy to avoid suicide gankers; in fact you can diminish the possibility of you being suicide ganked in empire to point where it is largely immaterial. So in reality, while eve is marketed as a hard core open world sand box pvp game, in truth it is a large safe area surrounded by "battle grounds" for consensual pvp. If anybody has reason to complain, its the pvpers who came here looking for a true open world pvp game, as the marketing doesnt match the reality.

As for the op, what exactly did you except when you signed up to play eve? With marketing like "be the villain," you were forewarned.

You're not having fun because you're looking for it in places you will not find. I for example hate soccer, so it's no use trying to play because I know I won't find enjoyment in it. Of course, I only know that because I have tried and I think that's the stage you're into.

However, keeping the analogy, eve is not a soccer game, it's a ball. You can play whatever you want with it, from soccer to dodgeball. You still have things in common between those games, like the use of a ball, and in eve's case it is the PvP and harsh consequences to failure. If you dislike it, simply drop the ball and play something else, it's not a shame.

However I strongly disagree with some of your points. Being a solo player with restrict playing time myself I can see that you're probably aiming to high or not being able to cope with the game mechanics. For instance, one of the most memorable times I had in exploration was when I got stuck in a null system trying to jump to low sec that was almost permanently gate camped. The gate didn't have any celestial I could warp to D-scan, so I had to study the kill times in the system and based on that I determined that there was a two hour gap where no kills were happening every day, and that gap would only match my playing time in a determined day of the week.

That might seem like a huge work but I used out of game tools and eventually logged to check how many players were in local. So you see, for two or three days I was playing the game and having fun without even having to log for 20 minutes.

And that's just an example. I don't have kids but I have a job and out of job activities that didn't allow me to play. I've met players that were 50 years old, others with small children, and they were able to have a lot of fun with the game. It's just a matter of getting into the game and seeing how you can have fun in your playing time.

And regarding your P2W theory: you can train a lot of skills to level 4 and even some to 5 in a month time. If you know what to focus on you can match months old players in an specific role. And you don't even have to log in to train, which would be a problem to someone like you and me. How is that pay to win?