Skill Discussions

I think thats a bit overly generalized and sound more like a defensive than a constructive post. Basically every online/offline game with skill and character progression may ask the question regarding to implement a skill revamp/modify system. Obviously there is no right or wrong, since either way has its advantages and disadvantages. I personally don't have a big problem with a fixed system, since i buy my toons anyway.

The main point i see in eve is the extreme long time some skill activities needs before u can gasp the full consequences, so as example u may like missles and caldari in PvE for the first year, but now u just joined a PvP corp and they basically tell u "skill lasers and Armor rep". There are many more examples, where probably everyone played eve might have thought to themself "damm if i just had skilled this rather than that, but i did not know this or that". Thats ofc because eve is extremely complex and complicated at the same time, so ofc u cant know everything.
It now boils down to weather u feel the game will profit or don't profit from a more flexible skill system. My main problem is the time it takes to test things in eve, precisely the requirement skills for some ships or activities. The tutorial is really bad and clumsy compared to other games, so its not a big help to decide what u may like or may not like in eve, so most new players stumble around trying to figure out whats in for them, but compared to other games it takes month rather than days to get a correct answer to weather u may like or dislike a activity. So a skill revamp system is only one option to solve those problems and i don't say its the only or best option.

bye Andy

Oh I have no problem with how i've chosen things, and i probably wouldn't change my skills even if i had the option.

But here's the issue. You need to find a middle ground between the elitists of this game (sorry but that's what you guys are, whether that's an insult or not), and the new players.

New players want everything on a silver platter like every other mmo. Screw that.

Old players want almost nothing about the fundamental system touched because they feel entitled to being the "elite" of the game.

Try to be objective and take a step back to make a healthier game. A skill remap would be fine, but make it a giant decision. As i said previously, giving the option only once every 2-3 years would be perfectly fine. You can say even that would ruin the game, but until you show me and objective, logical, and clear cut reason why even that would destroy the game, i'm just going to assume you're an elitist that doesn't want his baby touched.

You're blaming me for failing a rhetoric, while you also asset that the nerf/buff cycle is not much longer than 3 years?! Eve gets 2 expansions a year. You cannot plan around that.

And it's not an assertion. It's a fact. If you gave players a remap option, Eve would gain players, which makes the game healthier in the long run. 3 years is easily a long enough time for there to very clearly still be consequences. Once you hit that button (assuming this is the "cooldown), you cannot change anything for 3 years.

It's ridiculous to be throwing out "Oh just like every other mmo" when every other mmo allows you to basically do it at free will, and they're completely different games.

It makes the game healthier because people change what they like. If you have a player who has done PvE and combat for say 4 years, and he decides that he wants to mine. He has been giving money to CCP and been a loyal customer for years. He deserves that remap ability.

You also have to remember CCP is a company. If they want more players, they're going to have to cater to the general population, not just the old player base. But they don't have to screw over them either.

The only downside of a remap option with say, a 3 year cooldown, is that it would hurt what your idea of "Eve" is. Its too long to be able to remap around nerfs and buffs, because they happen on a large basis twice a year.

You see, unlike most players (because of ignorance), i want CCP and Eve to be around for a while. And i know that until they decide to start changing their philosophy to a more general population, then they'll either die out or remain in their current state.

Um, are you a very new player or something? The majority of expansions don't significantly change the game's balance in any way. The length of time for a ship type to go from the top of the PvP pile to the bottom and back up again is about three years.

Also, the general development course has been plotted out several years in advance, and they tell us what's coming with a year or more of warning. Can you actually not plan around that? Because if so, Eve may not be for you.

Don't suggest that shite again. Seriously.

I'll even back up that statement with a muscial number if so desired.

Firstly, takes away the point in skill training all together if you can just on a whim think "today I'll be a Minmatar pilot ace!"
Secondly, Makes attributes entirely pointless
Thirdly, Makes specialisation enitrely pointless
Fourthly, Everyone would just fly flavour of the month, which would then lead to just Meta on Meta action, which tbh is a horrific idea.

You mention a huge cooldown, still doesn't sway me, mainly because it'll just lead people bawling their eyes out and asking for a smaller cooldown, when something gets nerfed etc.

And in 2 years, assuming you did train the entire time, thats like 40mil SP. Hell you could fly every races subcap with t2 fittings and a majority of the t2/t3 ships in that time if you went pure combat, so not excatly benifical in that reguard. Same applies with industry. 40mil SP and you good to build/invent/PI like crazy.

You'll probably want to keep them seperate anyway so its entirely pointless.

Or you could train Remap Skills to V... three week cooldown in which you can't train anything else =p

-It removes the point of having skills to begin with.

How does this remove the point of having skills? Everything in the game is based on skills. This would just give you the ability to move points from set a to set b. You still need to train your skills to be able to fly a ship and fly it effectively.



-It removes the point of having attributes.

Attributes help with training certain skills. Training would still require x amount of time. You can only get so much SP per hour, attributes help that, but having SP remap would in no way detract from attributes. If you only trained a skill set that required x/y attribute you are still missing all the other skills in v/w. Hardly anyone who actively plays would train an entire year in one attribute set. The exception being people who are training caps/sup caps or the people who play the queue game with an alt account.



-It removes attribute implants from the game.

You still need implants to increase the amount of SP per hour. It would have 0 impact on implants as you still need them to get optimal sp/hour.



-It removes variety and instead encourages FOTM and cookie-cutter setups.

You can't remove variety in a sandbox game unless something is completely overpowered. Mini is FOTM right now, has been for a while. That doesn't mean if people were able to reset SP that the entire population of Eve would go Mini. I like the way Amarr and Gallente ships look. That is why I have them cross trained. I wouldn't suddenly go Mini if given the oppurunity because I like the Amarr and Gallente ships.



-It removes the uniqueness, history and "character" of your character.

The skills you train don't determine the "history" of your character. The actions you take determine the "history".



-It removes planning and choice and consequences.

How does this remove planning at all? If anything it makes planning that much more important. You have a lump sum of SP and you better damn sure know where you want to put it unless you end up with having missed out on very important skills.



-It removes goal-setting, progression and any achievement in those areas.

Again, how does this remove "goal setting". You are sounding like someone is just going to go year from year without having done anything in the game except skill queue random things in their set attribute group and reset them at the end. You still have to set your goals to progress from point a to point b. This would not change any of that.



-It kills character trading.

It would in no way, shape, or form kill character trading. If anything it would give characters a base price on SP, not on which skills you trained. It would actually simplify character trading as you could pick a character based on the amount of SP they have, not the skill set. People are always going to want to buy alts. This just makes the process of finding them 100000x easier.



-It massively boosts older characters over new ones.

How does this boost older characters over new ones? Most "older" characters are already cross trained in everything they want. Most "older" characters have been around long enough to afford to buy the perfect super cap skilled toon anyway. All this would do is give someone who wants to specialize the ability to do so. You want to know what gives older characters a boost over newer ones? Experience.



-It introduces "catching up" as a concept in EVE and instantly makes it impossible to do.

Please explain this "catching up" concept that would magically be put into Eve. You can't "catch up" in Eve unless you buy a ton of plex or RMT and purchase a toon from the bazaar. Even then the person would be ridiculously incompetent at using that character. Again,experience > everything.






All of your points make it sound like people are going to stop playing the game and just skill queue forever with a skill reset once a year. You will still need to plan your skills as this, from the suggestion, would be a once a year refund. You couldn't sit in one attribute set with one set of implants for a year and expect to get anywhere. Maybe after you get a year or more in the game you could do that, but for someone starting out or people who have been playing for a year and under you still have to plan so you can play the game. I have been playing the game on and off since 2008 and I have skills that I absolutely regret training or skills that I thought I would need and didn't. All an SP reset would do is allow me to make my character the way I want him to be without having to spend time that I already put in to get there.



That being said CCP will never allow this. The main reason is that, unless there were a high plex or cash charge, CCP would be losing money by allowing people to reset their SP. You know all those skills you screwed up on? Yeah, you had to pay CCP while you were screwing them up, and you had to keep paying them while you trained what you actually needed.

The only time I could ever see this being able to happen is if/when CCP takes Eve Online F2P, and yes Eve will be f2p in the future.

Makes no difference to me since i'm a little over a year away to max out the 60 skills in ship command tree(yes even all 4 titans to lvl 5), so instead of worrying about remap options, how about adding more content for the really old players of eve, those that are almost as old as the game itself...


We're not that many for sure and only represent a tiny percentage of the player base, but for a game that supposedly has no end, it seems like it's coming fast for the really old farts of eve...