EVE New Citizens Q&A

For mission running for Isk should I go Omen or Maller as a goal? And can someone recommend a build? Any specific skills I should get also?

That would depend upon your skills as a pilot.

The Omen does more DPS, and is faster. But it isn't nearly as durable as a Maller. And for a newbie, being able to consistently SURVIVE missions is will be better than doing missions a bit faster, but having to replace a few lost mission ships while doing so.

If you are okay with being a tad squishy, go with the Omen. If you'd like to keep the training wheels on a bit longer, go with the Maller.

Personally, when I was your age I used an Arbitrator. Drone boats ftw!

As for skills, I'll refer to a post I made the other day :

What you'll want to do is go buy all of the supporting skills for your chosen weapon system, armor/shield depending on your race, Engineering, navigation, and electronics. Train them up fairly evenly to at least lvl 4, and 5 where needed for T2 gear. You'll want strong drone skills too. Most ships in the game have a drone bay, and every battleship does to my knowledge. Drones are NOT optional. You WILL need them for lvl 4s. Train Drones V and Scout Drones to V for T2 lights/mediums quickly, and definitely before you sit in a BS.

Focus on T2 tanking equipment before weapons. It's faster, and being able to survive a screwup is far more important than your ISK/hour for the first few months. Have the respective spaceship command and weapons skills up for a said ship to at least 4 before undocking it.

Do not fall into the trap of "bigger is better". If you are having trouble in lvl 2s in a cruiser, buying a battlecruiser and taking on a lvl 3 will end up with you going back to station in a pod.

This is especially true for battleships. Flying a battleship with bad skills WILL end up with an embarassing lossmail. I lost an Armageddon to a lvl 3 because I just HAD to have a BS as soon as possible. The "I spent every ISK I had on a BS and lost it. I'm quitting EVE" story gets repeated every day.

My recommendations.

Frigates/Dessies : lvl 1 missions. T1 gear acceptable for all slots.

Cruisers : lvl 2 missions. High meta T1 gear acceptable, should really be working towards T2 tanking modules and capacitor skills. Train for T2 light/medium drones here if you are planning on flying droneboats.

Battlecruisers : LVL 2 and 3 missions. Meta 4 gear acceptable. Tanking mods really need to be T2, as should your cap mods. Should be using T2 drones, or working towards it. If you haven't already, train your jury rigging skills so you can fit any rigs you want.

Battleships : LVL 3s til you figure out the limitations of the BS hulls. You'll notice that you have a LOT of trouble hitting frigates/cruisers with your large guns. They aren't dangerous on their own, but they use Ewar and will warp scramble you in lvl 4s. Do not attempt a lvl 4 without full T2 tanking mods, T2 capacitor mods, all capacitor skills to at least 4, T2 drones, rigs (most likely CCCs), and meta 4 weapons. At this point, be working on T2 large weapons.

EDIT : Welcome to the Golden Fleet

I also trained into a Arby for Lvl 2's. And given how the Prophecy is prob the best Amarr BC for Lvl 3's , those drones skills will transfer well.

Thanks all for the replies. I guess some additional information. Right now I am solely wondering about missions for money and I guess doing them quickly but also without much risk because of course I do not have the resources to replace ships right now. I am still in my frigates that I got from the tutorial missions.

Long range killing/sniping would be preferred at least until I get a better tankier ship. Sadly the lasers I have are fairly short range. And no I do not roleplay. Working up laser skills so far but I did notice what Kaelnor mentioned about cap being an issue so I bought the 2 skillbooks to increase cap and help it regen faster. Also picked up the Hull Upgrades book too so I can increase my armor as well as the first drones book.

I thought Amarr wasn't really a drone faction. I thought that was Galliente. I do know that all larger ships have drones but did not think they were a big part of their DPS for this faction. Also I thought it says on the Arbitrator description it is mostly a EWAR ship?

With the recent ship re-balance, Amarr have almost as many drone options as the Gallente. However, nothing forces you to fly their drone ships. They also have plenty of laser ships to choose from.

Be aware that, if you use a laser ship, you are somewhat limited to doing missions in Amarr space. That's because the most common NPCs in Amarr space (Sansha, Blood Raiders) are weak against the EM+Thermal damage that lasers do, but NPC in other regions might have high resists against that damage (especially Angels).

As for doing missions for money: Lvl 1 and Lvl 2 missions pay very poorly. It gets a little bit better with lvl 3 missions, but the real money is in lvl 4 missions. However it won't do you good to jump right into a lvl 4 if you have neither the skill points nor the knowledge to run them.

As for skills, in addition to what has been said, if you haven't yet, pick up Controlled Bursts for the 5% per level reduction in weapon capacitor use.

Cruiser-size lasers will have a longer range just for being Cruiser-size. Although they will have problems tracking fast Frigates. Also, if you want range, make sure that you fit Beam lasers. (Or T2 Pulse lasers with Scorch, if you can use T2 guns.)

Thanks again all for the info. So if lasers are so limiting as to who I can fight should I look at changing factions? Also for cruiser is the Arbitrator really soloable for missions as it seems to have no weapon bonus just drone damage and EWAR? Is that better then a Maller or Omen with drones?


And I do understand what you said about hitting frigates already sometimes having that problem. Will need to check what skills I can buy to help with accuracy. Also I have no problems with having some extra drone help for damage but was reading about people complaining of them dying easily and quickly. Of course they were in higher level missions.

I don't know about Caldari or Minmatar space, but personally, I have no issues killing rats in Gallente space with lasers. I run a Prophecy in level 3s with no issues despite not having an "optimized" fitting (I run 2 beams and 2 pulse so I can fight at both long and short range, along with a heavy missile launcher paired with a target painter. Not optimized, but it works fine.)

Actually, mainly I use drones on frigs, lasers and missiles for cruisers, the Serpentis, Caldari, and Ammar ships I run into on missions die quickly.

Now for BSs, I do run all beam or pulse, but that is made easier by MJDs.