Skill Discussions

New players see level 5 skills as insurmountable barriers.
With everything at lvl 3 and 4 that first lvl 5/4 skill is a long time to commit, granted that with lvl 4 skills you can do a lot.
But that is what in the end makes newer players rush for BS, so that when they do commit to lvl 4s and 5s they get the awesome boat.

Giving people maxed out small weapons of choice and corresponding frigate skills would in my opinion give people a small island to operate from in an ocean of SP.
That would remedy a lot, when people are first introduced to the game they are so overwhelmed that when I introduce them to EvEmon they see it as too complicated to get into on a regular basis because they mentally anticipate the same complication they are already dealing with.
So they kind of go for "let me deal with this hot mess first before I use EvEmon" which usually means a decent amount of fail.

What is 10/9 days worth of training on the grand total when you give people a small skillset that really makes them shine, and give them an actual idea of what lvl 5 skills do and some reluctance to train away from what they already shine with.
That said EvE really needs a COMPREHENSIVE skill-point tutorial.
This is not an EZ-mode suggestion but more a reference to the fact there are so MANY skills at first you are struggling to remember skill names or to keep electronics, mechanic and engineering skills apart as to which boosts grid or cpu and which modules the secondary skills affect.... Did I even buy all the relevant skills and what are their names?? 5/8 some different skill names with "shield", read through all and remember their bonuses at some point.....
That is what being a new guy is; deciding what skill to take to 4-5 while you are feeling one hell of an inadequate to make a decision for any skills which effects you don't recall 100%.
So you go for ship skills since their effect is very comprehensible, ill say it again people get lost in the support skills and don't see their importance due to the complexity of their nature and the memory game that keeps them from said comprehension.

Give them maxed frig and small weapon skills of one empire so they feel like they take a step down changing weapons, or when they start dumping SP into cruisers and feel like they made a mistake they can fall back on their basic skillset removing insecurity over SP choices and incentivizing building onto what they feel comfortable about already: their basic skillset.

They don't NEED Frig V and t2 Frig weapons to shine... That's the POINT. And if you give it to them, when do they learn this? Let's give all new players essentially the prereqs to get into an AF's by day 3, won't they just compain vets have AF 5? Suddenly, they hop into a wolf or enyo or retribution, only to complain and moan how I ganked them in an atron, or merlin, or helios, resulting in an even bigger loss. Instead, the new player needs to get this pounded in their head: Hey, that blaster enyo has really short range, or that omen has poor tracking, or ship x has weakness y that I can exploit by... That's how you really win when soloing!

You contradict yourself, according to the following link lvl4 missions generate about 50mil+ an hour. So a veteran who considers 100mil to be a lot, 2 hours of level 4 should be enough to fund w/e pvp activity they desire.

I do agree with OP however in some of his/her ideas, but as s/he said s/he's just throwing ideas out there for discussion. As for those who say, newbies do not want this, that may be so for some but not for all, at least not for me. I've been playing for a month and what got me to play was reading so many great war stories, streams and what not. Once I started playing I soon realized that it would be at least a year to get to that level of endgame, and not because of ISK, actual skills or experience, but rather how long I keep my subscription.

Regarding missions and incursions, there is an entry wall which is based on how well one can fit their ship. Which again comes down to how long their subscription been running.

This. Not much more to say tbh.

If it really was as simple as that, more new players would be out flying Dictors. But it's not as simple as that, not by a long shot. A massive part of EVE's charm is its freedom of choice. So forcing new players into ships for months on end until they can fly the ships they actually want to fly is in-turn a massive turn off. Even if it is largely a matter of perception, it is a perception not nearly enough is being done to address.

As a new player, I feel constricted by the sheer volume of skills out there. At the same time, I feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of choice over what to fly. I have ship skills, weapon skills, support skill, EW skills, drone skills, ect, ect... All that need to levelled to a somewhat competent level - which on it's own can take months, all whilst not being able to train for what they actually want to fly. It's daunting and puts people off before they're even able to give the game a fitting chance (pun intended ).

So, if it only takes a couple of months, literally only a couple of months to train all the basic ship, weapon, support, EW, drone, ect skills to a competent level...then in the bigger picture of say 5 years, what is the big deal with giving all those extremely basic skills to new players from the get go? So they can actually get into the thick of it all at the beginning and start training towards what they really want.

A couple of months worth of basic skills in the big picture is a drop in the ocean at this stage in the game, it's nothing. Yet at the same time it would solve EVE's biggest player retention issue - new players feeling highly restrained because there's so many god damn basic skills out there to level. Not to mention hunting all over the Universe for them whilst not being able to afford most of them.

A couple of months worth of basic skills means nothing to a Veteran player, absolutely nothing. It certainly won't put new players at an advantage or make them rush out and do anything majorly stupid, these are only basic skills remember.

Well that's how I'd help a new players passage into EVE, and it would go a hell of a long way to stopping new players from feeling so ridiculously overwhelmed.

According to you, obviously. But not to the copious amount of new players that quit because it is literally too overwhelming for them.

There is nothing, nothing at all from stopping new players from doing all you've just listed , all whilst having a boost in the starting skills they get. For one they could leave the tutorial exactly how it is, except whilst teaching new players about skills, weapons, ships ect, they could have it unlock batches of pre-levelled basic skills as mission rewards instead. Not necessarily fully levelled skills, level 3/4 maybe. All whilst giving new players an incentive to fully complete the tutorial.

There are so many ways CCP could lessen the blow to new players feeling overwhelmed, ways that really wouldn't impact the game in the bigger picture at all.

This is another part of the problem... It has nothing to do with a learning curve in terms of physical game difficulty. Giving new players better starting skills isn't going to make the game physically easier - it will just make it more forgiving. It will allow new players to experiment and start getting their hands dirty straight away without feeling so apprehensive about it when they see all the skills they are "supposed" to have. Getting all these basic skills is not difficult, it does not have a high learning curve - it is just a pain in the butt and can be very overwhelming. It's not fun, plain and simple.

That picture is absolutely right, it makes people want to kill themselves, i.e. quit. That is not a learning curve, it is an obstacle, an obstacle that honestly has no place in the game anymore.

The game will still be difficult and require a shed ton of learning, but at least they will be able to get on with it without the unnecessary obstacle.

So now we have 2 threads "debating" the infamous "SP Issue".

Will this thread reach 36 pages like the other one?

Which thread will reach the page count limit first (I sincerely hope there's a page count limit; ISD, CCP, anyone)?

Will anything be "resolved" during those dozens of pages of ever repeating posts?

Stay tuned and find out! (Hopefully before the sun sets for the final time in a few aeons).

Oy, I thought we resolved this.

You've mentioned yourself several times how overwhelming the game is for a new player. That's really what a limited skillset is aimed to address. When you're already overwhelmed, the last thing you need is lots of options. New players start with basic skills so that they can spend their first week or two learning the mechanics of the game... how to fly a ship, how turrets work, how missiles work, big ships vs. small ships, tackling, ewar, the various sensors/scanners available to them. Consider it "driver's education". New players need to take some time to practice these core player skills before they branch out and start trying the various careers available. If you were to give them skillsets to immediately launch into an advanced career, you'd end up with a bunch of frustrated people either not understanding why they're failing or thinking that their poor performance (due to simply not knowing how to do things properly) is simply what to expect from the game.

Eve is not really a game for the impatient or those requiring instant gratification. I usually cringe when people say "then you shouldn't play Eve anyway" and such, but honestly... anyone who's not willing to put up with some time up front learning the basics is probably not going to last long anyway.

I wouldn't say a few months worth of training though, I think a large part of the SP problem needs solved through a tutorial when it comes to things like: Tracking, ship size, support skills, drones, missiles, turrets and the often overlooked navigation skills.
Tossing SP at it not so much, if you start off with too high a support skills that is stuff you cant do again.
If you level ship skills the effect is so obvious and linear, designing your fitting and energy management skillset is an intricate part of getting a good feel of how much capacitor your ship uses and which items are heavy on cpu/grid.
Which is why I suggested small turrets and ship skills, they are skills you can sort of do over with other weapon/ship types giving you plenty comparison by just flying something else.
Support skills are universal though and you wont get this opportunity.
So say if you don't deal with a glaring deficiency of capacitor output on an Amarr ship you will have to look up what is going on, if you start with said skills at 3-4 you will miss it for the longest time and not understand priorities and weaknesses.
Again a better tutorial would be awesome for this.
Frig skills and small weapons don't really have that effect since it commonly has nothing to do with spaceship management as they are straight up defense and damage bonuses, not things that keep the ship running.