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EVE New Citizens Q&A

 
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Better to create a new character to fly other races ships?

Author
Mai Susano
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#1 - 2013-08-09 23:16:48 UTC
Hey,
So I play as Caldari and let say that I want to fly only Amarr ships, is it better to create a new character as Amarr or its fine if I just learn skills on this one?

Thanks
Toriessian
Helion Production Labs
Independent Operators Consortium
#2 - 2013-08-09 23:18:46 UTC
Just train them on your current character. There are several general support skills you'd have to train to fly the ships well anyways. Think skills like electronics, gunnery, mechanics, weapon upgrades. You'd have to do all those twice.

Every day I'm wafflin!

Kahega Amielden
Rifterlings
#3 - 2013-08-09 23:39:07 UTC
Mai Susano wrote:
Hey,
So I play as Caldari and let say that I want to fly only Amarr ships, is it better to create a new character as Amarr or its fine if I just learn skills on this one?

Thanks


Other than some very minor starting skills and standings (both of which can be easily acquired on any other character), race/bloodline is purely cosmetic.
Xercodo
Cruor Angelicus
#4 - 2013-08-09 23:41:30 UTC
You it's only a few thousand ISK and couple hours to catch up to what a new Amarr character would have really.

The Drake is a Lie

Riel Saigo
Facta.Non.Verba
#5 - 2013-08-10 00:27:49 UTC
You'll find the Amarr frigate and destroyer skill books are pretty cheap and easy to train up.

They'll get more expensive as you get bigger ships. But no more so than the Caldari ones would be anyway.
Alaric Faelen
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#6 - 2013-08-10 00:53:54 UTC
Eve's unique training mechanic means it's never really better to train an alt to do something. Your main will have the core skills already done that would need to be repeated for each character. The Nav tree for example is universal. New toons mean retraining this whole tree needlessly.

Just train it on your main.
Solai
Doughfleet
Triglavian Outlaws and Sobornost Troika
#7 - 2013-08-10 05:50:57 UTC
Alaric Faelen wrote:
Eve's unique training mechanic means it's never really better to train an alt to do something. Your main will have the core skills already done that would need to be repeated for each character. The Nav tree for example is universal. New toons mean retraining this whole tree needlessly.

Just train it on your main.

Not entirely true -
While it's never worthwhile to split combat alts, it does make sense to train an industrial or trade alt. Those skill sets have little to no crossover with combat-ship oriented skills.

But as everyone else has said it does not make sense to make an Amarr combat alt or a Caldari combat alt, etc. Particularly since they overlap on more skills than they have independent skills.
Alaric Faelen
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#8 - 2013-08-10 08:18:39 UTC
Solai, I have to disagree. Unless that alt NEVER undocks, then you will need to retrain all the basic skills all ships use. Maybe not to the levels of a PvP toon, but you must duplicate some of that effort with any new toon. Given that you can only train one toon at a time per acct (ignoring CCP incentives like paying a plex), it is just wasted time to retrain those skills.

This toon for example has piddling industrial skills in favor of intensive combat skill training. If I needed to do industrial tasks for some reason, there is no benefit to creating a whole new toon to train those skills.I would have to suspend combat skill training on this toon just the same whether I put indy skills in this que or create another toon to do it in.

So- if I suddenly wanted to become a miner, I would be far better off training those skills on this toon and undocking a mining barge with max agility, hull EHP, resists, and fitting room- than creating a new toon for it and either having to retrain all that, or accept an inferior toon in every other regard. Like the adage goes- you can't really catch up to an older toon in Eve. No real benefit trying.

Unless......

Alts tend to be used primarily to dodge game mechanics. Low sec status, war decs, getting more research slots to benefit the main toon.....while I'm not going to cast stones at the practice, I am saying that an honest appraisal of almost any alt will be that it's working around some game limitation.

Lastly, your advice of making an Amarr or Caldari combat alt because everyone does is flawed. PvP does not reward dabbling with in Eve. To train a combat toon to be much more than cannon fodder requires a heavy investment in skill training (not to mention actual experience on your part). Thus, you negate your own argument. Anything but a throwaway scout alt for your actual PvP toon will require lengthy training to be average at best.
In six months you can have one excellent toon ready to branch out to most anything in Eve, or have three toons that can each do one or two things as long as it doesn't include undocking.
Your game, play how you want. But Eve's class-less skill system specifically removes the incentive for multiple toons.
Solai
Doughfleet
Triglavian Outlaws and Sobornost Troika
#9 - 2013-08-10 10:53:42 UTC  |  Edited by: Solai
I see your point. But I suspect the biggest, dominant reason for splitting combat vs indy alts is this:
While you COULD train up mining on your combat, and have lots of useful utility and tank skills ready to roll, you're doing that at the expense of training more combat. Rather than training for mining skills for whatever large chunk of time, I'd prefer to keep spicing up my the characters main focus: PVP. Improving that is a really long road. I suspect most who are in that position agree.

Mining and Industry is a pretty long road too. So you have to choose. Can't have both, not unless you have the luxury of an old account. Or you could make an alt and do both, and have both routes continuing to work at specializing their strength.

Alaric Faelen wrote:
Lastly, your advice of making an Amarr or Caldari combat alt because everyone does is flawed. PvP does not reward dabbling with in Eve. To train a combat toon to be much more than cannon fodder requires a heavy investment in skill training (not to mention actual experience on your part). Thus, you negate your own argument. Anything but a throwaway scout alt for your actual PvP toon will require lengthy training to be average at best.

I think you've misread my post. I suggest that having multiple combat alts is a mistake. The only circumstance I can think of right now that would promote a split-off combat alt would be a super-cap alt.
Alaric Faelen
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#10 - 2013-08-10 20:12:50 UTC
But Solai, the normal training mechanics mean that on a single acct, I would not be training combat skills anyway if I were training indy skills, regardless of what character the training is being done on. By training anything else, on any of the three toon slots per acct, I have to either stop training on this toon or train the skill directly to this toon. I can only train one skill at a time per acct, not per toon I create.

Eve doesn't use a class-based paradigm. So there is little point in having a 'PvP toon' and an 'indy' toon and a 'hauler alt' unless you need to get around game mechanics. They are convenient, but by definition every moment training one takes away from training the others.

For example this toon's career is PvP pilot, but I can also do PI to pay the bills and do invention, plus haul my own stuff around. It wouldn't benefit me to have another toon to do the same. In fact, if I'm ever caught out in my PI hauler, I have a better chance of survival with this highly trained toon than a mediocre alt. This guy will have a full T2 tank, rigs, ability to OH in a pinch....this toon may well escape where a poor cousin alt gets podded.

I didn't misread you, what I disagreed with was forcing a class system on Eve toons. Having a 'combat toon' and an 'indy toon' and a 'hauler toon' flies in the face of the entire system Eve is based on. Beyond that, a great many of the skills you train are not mutually exclusive like mining and gunnery. The entire Nav tree and core engineering skills for example. You'd be better off with one toon that has max cap in every ship versus three toons that cap out trying to warp across a system.

You CAN have both indy and combat in one toon, it just takes time. I think it'll take longer trying to cook up multiple toons to only do single tasks.
But like I said, it's just a game, so whether you are training at max efficiency is for nerds. Just have fun with it.
Solai
Doughfleet
Triglavian Outlaws and Sobornost Troika
#11 - 2013-08-10 20:40:02 UTC  |  Edited by: Solai
*blink blink*

When I say alt, and when most people talk about alts in Eve within the context of a discussion like this, we're talking about separate accounts.

I'll just leave it at that.
Alaric Faelen
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#12 - 2013-08-10 23:01:50 UTC
That would be a different situation entirely. A whole other acct is not the de facto method of playing Eve. It's common, but is not the paradigm I'd default to when talking to a new player. This is new citizens sub-forum after all.

I do not believe the OP was talking about creating an entire new acct, but cross training his one and only acct main character. That is a very common question in the new citizens forum, and rarely is it in reference to other acct's.