Warfare & Tactics

I feel your pain. For a very long time I was pummeled into the ground during pvp. Which was frustrating because it's why I start any MMO. I love to pvp.

In my experience knowledge is power. The more you can deduce about your opponent and their ship the better your chances are on deciding if to engage, when to engage, and how to engage. To have this knowledge on hand off the top of your head without cheat sheets is quite a bit to memorize if you're just starting out. It's no easy undertaking but it's invaluable. For example, you should be able to look at a ship, know it's bonuses, what resist it has (this becomes more important when you're facing T2 ships with natural resistance to certain damage types) and also, look at the weapons on the ship and know if they are long range weapons (beams, artillery, rails, etc) or short range (pulse, autocannons, blasters, etc).

People often say start with frigates because it's a cheap launching point where you can constantly lose ships without too much loss. If you're flying battlecruisers all day at the start and losing them left and right, you're wallet is going to take quite a hit.

I've learned a lot myself over the years, but the one thing that taught me the most, in the shortest amount of time, was a guy named Abaddon21 who runs the site www.eveproguides.com. He runs video tutorials, pdf cheat sheets, and walk throughs on how to pvp effectively solo. Most of the good stuff he charges a one time membership fee for unfortunately, but having paid for his frigate guide, I can say it's well worth it.

FYI I'm not affiliated with his site myself, I just found it the single most helpful thing i've come across for getting better at pvp in a short amount of time.

As far as how much money to put into a ship, It doesn't have to be a great deal. I threw together an imicus that cost less than 5 million the other day and got an easy kill in some faction warfare zones. Then later that night i put together a Tristan worth about 10-15 million. I was able to take out some of the more sturdy pvp ships with that one.

Unfortunately I can't suggest a specific good solar system for pvp. I only know my area of the galaxy that I usually hang out in, and can't really compare it to other areas of the game.

As far as killing any ships with an atron, yes, it's certainly possible, but I personally haven't heard a great deal of high praise for that particular ship on the forums where people discuss their favorite ships.

Edit: And yes. you can easily play the market and pvp at the same time. Just as long as you're mindful about not letting your security status drop too much. I personally haven't found this to be much of a problem. Granted I'm not out gate camping every single night like some pirates.

I've got 80mil SP and I still don't have all the relevant skills maxed out. Luckily, for just frigates, you don't need that much. It's not feasable to start listing every skill you can use. I suggest you load your ships fit into EFT and right-click the various modules to see which skills affect them. Start from there and use some common sense. A whole bunch of level 3 skills will likely help you more than one level 5.



Yes, it's possible, either jumpclone back and forward to the market hubs, fly through empire in a shuttle/empty pod or use an alt (on the same or a different account).



People advise you do fly frigates because they are cheap, they are fast and agile and much more forgiving than the larger stuff. If you go out in a cruiser you won't have more success at PvP. Established PvP'ers will still kill you and you'll have lost 40mil instead of 5-10.

Frigates will let you pick your fights. It is of course up to you to do so wisely.

Skills help, T2/meta 4 fit helps. What helps most is knowing your fit and knowing what you can engage with it. The ship itself doesn't matter so much, as long as you fit/use it right and don't fight opponents whose ship outclasses yours.



There are thousands of guides, wiki pages, blogs, etc. google search, read stuff. Try this: http://www.evealtruist.com/
Honestly, the best advice I can give you is to join a newbie friendly PvP corp that has decent FCs. The learning curve is a lot less steep when you have someone telling you what to do before you have to figure it out by yourself.

What systems is concerned, the FW region is not a bad place to start PvP'ing.

If you insist on learning the hard way (I did) then analyse every loss. Make sure you know why lost the fight and don't dismiss it as being because the enemy had better skills/modules. Losing ships without learning from it is a waste of your time.

-Should you have taken the fight in the first place?
-Did you overheat?
-Were you using the right ammo?
-Did you manage to stay at your optimal range during the fight?
-How was the enemy countering you?
-Can you prevent that in the future?



My frigates for soloing cost between 7 and 14 mil. Some of my corp mates routinely get solo kills in 2mil frigates. I feel the extra performance is worth it though.

Yes, you can kill other frigates in an Atron. It might not be the most newbie friendly ship, but ...

This.

And even if you want to go solo/want no corp/hate people, join an Agony Unleashed class, do the rounds with Eve Uni, join RvB for a month. Those will help you lots.

I agree with everything Nexxala said, with a small caveat.

While joining RvB and blobbing for a while is invaluable, there is also some pretty good 1v1 to be had there as well. RvB has a system dedicated to nothing but 1 on 1 frigate fighting. You can go there and get plenty of 1v1 experience. Also, RvB enforces 1v1 fights that are accepted in local. By "enforced" I mean you can challenge anyone in RvB to a 1v1 in local and if accepted, you can count on NOT being blobbed at the location agreed upon. Also, any terms are enforceable, such as 1v1 FRIGATE ONLY or T1 frigates, or dessies, etc. If anyone else from RvB interferes, they can be kicked from RvB permanently. These types of duels are common in RvB which makes it one of the few places in Eve that you can get a relatively fair 1 on 1 fight. Also, off-grid boosters are frowned upon in RvB and "neutral" offgrid boosting is strictly prohibited. RvB gets alot of crap (looking at you Kil2) about the restrictions, but those restrictions do make for a more friendly learning environment for new players.

On the other hand, don't join RvB and expect to be hand-held and tutored through learning pvp. Won't happen.

It's actually 15-20km (depending on rigs) with Dual Light Pulse Lasers and Scorch.

Otherwise you've managed to explain very clearly how new players should think about PvP. Nice write-up.

I would write something nice and informative about low sec pvp but..

This thread has a lot of text...

<.<

Soo many people on these boards will tell you there is no solo. This is wrong!! You can get solo and small gang engagements every night in T1 frigs. Solo is very popular at the moment.

(Yes you will get ganked and yes people will have links, but not everyone, tbh I would say the majorit don't)

Basically you go to the Faction Warfare systems (no need to join FW). To do this open the map and filter by sov, FW, all factions.

Fit a T1 frig for brawling, which means, a scram, web, some kind of buffer or active tank, and a load of damage.

Look for the novice and small plexes on your overview.

Learn to d-scan.

D-scan from range on a tight angle to see if any is in the plex, then decide if you want to fight or not.

Go and sit in a plex and switch between a short and long d-scan to see if anyone is coming for you. If they are solo, then stay for the fight.

You will loose frigs. You will eventually start getting kills. Watch loads of youtube vids and people streaming on twitch for help.

Sorry I didn't have time to type more!

That system has recently been changed to t1 cruiser down and t2/faction frigs to promote more activity. That said, I never have a problem finding tech 1 frigate 1v1s in RvB. I actually spend way more time soloing than participating in fleets. People also tend to be very friendly after duels in RvB, offering fitting advice and flying tips for the new pilots. It's a great way to find a lot of targets who are doing the same thing as you - cheap solo engagements with the intent of learning how to better PvP. That of course in addition to the ample fleet opportunities.