EVE New Citizens Q&A

I have been playing in Hi-sec for a while now mainly trading out of Jita and have only just noticed the mastery on ships. In 53 days I will be able to have mastery lvl 5 on a charon.

How important is it to gain mastery lvl's on different ships (I plan to use an alt to go into low and null secs) and is it worth aiming for lvl 5 mastery or would a lower lvl mastery be beneficial?

Also what sort of difference would say a lvl 3 mastery battleship would I be expected to see against one with no mastery lvl?

Go to LS/null in a frigate not a BS.

Mastery itself is like any certification, it doesn't do anything itself, it just looks nice on a wall or might look good to your employer.

PvP encounters are normally asymmetrical, and the paper benefits of raising any given skill from a 3 to a 5 are usually outweighed by player ship handling skills or the disparity in ship numbers on each side. BS V is worth nothing if you get scanned down by 5 frigates that know what they are doing.

I've found that raising a skill from a 4 to a 5 is usually not the difference between winning or losing a given encounter. It might be the difference between winning, holding, or losing the encounter before help arrives-- not necessarily help for you.

Ok thanks for the replies Viserys Anstian and Iria Ahrens given both a like.

Thanks also erg cz

A true statement but with a little twist.

The Mastery levels (as was certificates before) is written based on using every style/system/possibility a certain hull has.

They are best used as a guide to what skills you might need, not as a requirement to use a hull the way you want.

Read the descriptions on the skills you're missing for a level and make your own decision if it's worth it.

And while the listed skills can be bit strange, it's better then reading descriptions of all available skills and deciding if you want them ...

Mastery level 1 or 2 is probably worth doing blind (i.e. just do all the skills without thinking about it too much) for most ships that you actually intend to fly around a lot.

Above that, look at the specific skills and what they do and pick the ones that you know will help you or are important. Most people have all the qualifiers for Mastery 5 save for one or two skills before they even get mastery 3, simply because those last couple skills aren't particularly useful.

And no, it doesn't give you anything special to get masteries, it only gives you what the stats say.

Poppycock. Don't go into low/null with a BS unless you have an escort or you are prepared otherwise to defend yourself when you are attacked. BS might be slow and clunky, but that does not mean they're helpless. Source: I semi-regularly roam in solo BS in lowsec and nullsec, with decent success rates.

That said, I would advise new players to stay away from battleships for at least their first 5-6 months. The amount of both skill points and personal knowledge required to "properly" take advantage of a battleship simply means that in most tasks, a new player would be better off either using a smaller ship, or working with some friends. Jumping into a battleship too early can make the game dull, frustrating, or just end up in an expensive lossmail.

Anyway, on to the actual question. Mastery levels are bullshit. They make for nice bragging rights, but that's it. I have been flying combat frigates for years, and can take advantage of all their ins and outs, and yet I do not have mastery 5 for any of them. I might have mastery 4 for a couple, but that's it. Many of the required skills for the higher tiers do not actually meaningfully benefit the ship in 99% of instances. So... don't sweat it.

On the other hand, the skills listed in masteries do all impact your ship in some way, and certain ones impact it in very important ways. Do your research, or ask an experienced friend: what part of these masteries should I focus on? For example, Tactical Shields Manipulation V is useless, but training it to IV is fairly critical (so you can fit T2 Invulnerability Fields). Also, if it's listed for a ship that you prefer to armor tank (say, the Slasher or Bellicose), forget about it.

Speaking of masteries thy actually do seem to be better thought out then the old certificate system, however there are some odd quirks such as the Moros (a dreadnought) requiring a mastery for sensor integrity when the said ship is only ever used equipped with a siege module (immunity to all e-war modules) which obviously makes the requirement rather odd.

However as previous posters have stated treat the masteries as a road amp not a goal on it self.

As I am a nice guy and this is the New Citizens forum I will say please disregard this part of Jai's post. Ignore me at your own risk

Maybe not the best example, I admit, because training both would increase your overall flexibility in BS hulls. I gave this example because I have mastery 0 in a few hulls due to not having all skills trained, but I still fly those ships effectively. These skills are relevant to modules and drones I currently do not fit on the ship. I'm just as effective in a ship of which I have higher mastery levels, but I have less flexibility in fitting.

Concrete example: I can fly and fit a fullly T2-fitted Torp Typhoon but I have no Cruise Missile Skills yet. I end up having mastery level 0 because of this. In no way does this prevent me from using a Torp Phoon if it is more appropriate then say a Tempest, for which I have actual mastery levels.

There was some other example where someone had a level of mastery requiring him to train into being able to lock more ships then the actual ship hull could. That's where it becomes over-redundant.