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EVE New Citizens Q&A

 
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Please help to create the Path
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Victor Star
Imperial Academy
Amarr Empire
#1 - 2012-02-03 20:00:04 UTC
When I was a boy, I dreamed to be commander of space cruiser. Now, looking at EVE features, it looks like that the dream may come true! :)

And I need an advice how to bind my vision of this commander with current game engine. What skills I should learn, what ships fly and so on. In my dream it was very successful commander, and I hope he will be the same in real game life :)

Below is the path of this commander from my dreams. First of all, he is devoted imperial soldier, so race question is almost done: it's Amarr. The future path can be split at three stages:

1. Commander of the border patrol ship.
After graduation from military academy, he has been assigned to small but well armed patrol ship. Its task was to protect empire's border from intruders, and also fight and pirates.

2. Commander of the light cruiser.
Then he has been assigned to the light cruiser. This cruiser was fast, well armed and well shielded (not, however, armored). His main tasks where special missions outside of empire, like long-distance exploration in dangerous areas or providing the ceasefire between government and rebels in small worlds. Also he had missions to protect these small worlds (which were in empire's zone of inflience) from pirates or directly fight pirate bases.

3. Commander of submerged cruiser.
Being unordinary person, he got an unordinary ship - the cruiser which can dive into subspace and became almost invisible. In my dreams, this cruiser was also armed with special electro-magnetic cannon: it can fire thin metal bolts with enormous speed, so they can pierce any ship through. The ship with this cannon, even small, was able to destroy a battleship if it knowns to which specific (and weak) point of ship it must fire. I am not sure the game has such weapon (it seems overpowered), so the alternative to this can be torpedoes.
Soon after this our commander got several such ships under his command. Main task of this small fleet was fighting with large empire's enemies, like campains against antagonistic countries and or against large groups of pirates or hostile creatures.

Huh :)
There I need a help with fitting it into the game, and answering some of these questions:

What starting stats should I allocate?
What skills should I train?
What ship should I choose?
Where should I get missions?
What kind of guild should I pick up?

And, also, any other things you wanna tell are welcome!
Petrus Blackshell
Rifterlings
#2 - 2012-02-03 21:28:03 UTC
What ships you fly determines a LOT of how you play, so I will answer that primarily.

Victor Star wrote:
1. Commander of the border patrol ship.
After graduation from military academy, he has been assigned to small but well armed patrol ship. Its task was to protect empire's border from intruders, and also fight and pirates.


Frigates and their heavier counterparts, Assault Frigates, may be what you are looking for. As you mentioned Amarr:


  • The Punisher is the basic combat frigate you can fly. It is reasonably difficult to fly well, but is quite a nice little gunboat when you manage to do so. As all Amarr gunboats, it uses lasers.
  • The Retribution is a more powerful gunboat version of the Punisher. It has far better laser ability and better armor.
  • The Vengeance is another version of the Punisher, but focused on being unbreakable rather than having lots of firepower. It is one of the toughest assault frigates to kill. Unlike the Retribution and Punisher, it is made to use rockets (its inventors, Khanid Innovations, liked it that way better).
  • The Imperial Navy Slicer is another really popular frigate. It is not very hardy (unlike the Punisher and its variants) but it is amazingly fast and has very long range lasers. It can usually down its target without even being hit.


Victor Star wrote:
2. Commander of the light cruiser.
Then he has been assigned to the light cruiser. This cruiser was fast, well armed and well shielded (not, however, armored). His main tasks where special missions outside of empire, like long-distance exploration in dangerous areas or providing the ceasefire between government and rebels in small worlds. Also he had missions to protect these small worlds (which were in empire's zone of inflience) from pirates or directly fight pirate bases.


So far as Amarr ships go, you're somewhat stuck here. The Amarr by far prefer armor tanking over other sorts of tank, and there are very few good ways to use shield setups Amarr ships. It sounds like you're moving towards more of a reconnaissance role. For that, I would recommend the Arbitrator and its advanced variants, the Curse and Pilgrim. They do not have the most powerful firepower (they use drones for damage primarily), but offer other advantages in that they have electronic warfare capability in the form of tracking disruptors (rendering enemy turrets useless) and in the case of the Curse and Pilgrim, energy neutralizers (draining the capacitor of enemy ships). The Curse is one of the few Amarr ships that can be effectively outfitted with shields. The Pilgrim is a covert ship and can wander about without being noticed.

Victor Star wrote:
3. Commander of submerged cruiser.
Being unordinary person, he got an unordinary ship - the cruiser which can dive into subspace and became almost invisible. In my dreams, this cruiser was also armed with special electro-magnetic cannon: it can fire thin metal bolts with enormous speed, so they can pierce any ship through. The ship with this cannon, even small, was able to destroy a battleship if it knowns to which specific (and weak) point of ship it must fire. I am not sure the game has such weapon (it seems overpowered), so the alternative to this can be torpedoes.
Soon after this our commander got several such ships under his command. Main task of this small fleet was fighting with large empire's enemies, like campains against antagonistic countries and or against large groups of pirates or hostile creatures.


To be fair, all capsuleer ships are "unordinary". From what you describe as a "submerged ship", you will probably enjoy the cloaking mechanics. All ships can fit cloaks, but the result on most ships is that you can hardly move while the cloak is active (and you can't even warp around). Additionally, when the cloak is off, the ship has a very reduced targeting speed. There are exceptions, though: Covert Ops ships. They can warp around while cloaked, and don't have their targeting systems impaired by equipping a cloak. There are three sorts of these:

Covert ops scanning frigates, like the Anathema. These have next to no firepower, and are really fragile, but serve an important role: finding things. They are specialized in using probes to find any ship or location hiding out in space. The bonus is that, since they can cloak while doing this, they are unfindable themselves.

Stealth bombers, like the Purifier. These are frigate-sized craft that sport battleship-sized torpedo missile bays. They are fairly fragile, but do incredible damage for their size. They can also equip area of effect bomb launchers, and are masters at hit-and-run strikes.

Force recon ships, like the Pilgrim. They make formidable support ships or vanguard forces, as they can reduce enemy ability to do anything useful.

Accidentally The Whole Frigate - For-newbies blog (currently on pause)
Petrus Blackshell
Rifterlings
#3 - 2012-02-03 21:39:09 UTC
Now, for other questions

What starting stats should I allocate?
What skills should I train?

Each ship you fly has a "Recommended" and a "Prerequisites" section in its "Show Info" window (right clicking on the ship). The prerequisites you are required to have in order to be able to fly the ship, while the recommended list is a list of certificates.

Certificates are essentially lists of skill sets that you have trained. Click on each one for ships you want to fly, and see what they require you to train. Then, use that as a guideline for what you should train next.

You can also look into skill planning programs such as EVEMon. I have never used one myself, but I hear they can be very useful

Where should I get missions?

Start by completing all of the tutorial missions (or at least, all of them concerning combat). Then, you can continue getting to know the Eve universe better by picking up the Sisters of Eve arc of missions from Sister Alitura in Arnon. After that, there are literally hundreds (if not thousands) of NPC agents that you can pick up missions from, usually in hisec or lowsec stations.

What kind of guild should I pick up?

First of all, they're called corporations (or corps, for short). It gets on Eve players' nerves when they are called guilds, even if that is essentially what they are.

You will want to find someplace that is explicitly "newbie-friendly". That means they do not mind being asked questions and showing you the ropes. I have heard good things about EVE University, though I have a bit of a grudge against them for killing me horribly a year ago.

After you get a good grip of how things work, you might want to transfer to another corp. You sound like you might be into RP, so you could look into corps of that sort (particularly in the militia if you want to have an easy cause to fight for). Other than that, just look around and see what you find.

And, also, any other things you wanna tell are welcome!

Welcome to Eve! Feel free to mail me or convo me in-game (or continue posting here) if you have questions.

Accidentally The Whole Frigate - For-newbies blog (currently on pause)
Petrus Blackshell
Rifterlings
#4 - 2012-02-03 21:44:26 UTC
Oh, I should mention I run a for-newbies blog at http://blackshell-eve.blogspot.com. Something I would draw your attention to is don't move into big ships immediately. Personal piloting skills are as important as the in-game skill levels. I have fought many a newbie in a ship that they did not know how to fly. I have killed battlecruiers and battleships using mere frigates. Don't let it happen to you.

Accidentally The Whole Frigate - For-newbies blog (currently on pause)
Mara Rinn
Cosmic Goo Convertor
#5 - 2012-02-04 00:05:30 UTC  |  Edited by: Mara Rinn
I would highly recommend training to fly a stealth bomber. Border patrol, reconnaissance, attacking the darkness with torpedoes — the stealth bomber has it all!

As for skills to train: I would head down the path of:

  • Frigate 5 (base requirement for your racial T2 frigate) - the most talked about stealth bomber is the Manticore, though I would highly recommend the Hound
  • Cloaking 4 (to use a covert ops cloaking device)
  • All the missile skills. Just throw about 10M SP in there and you'll be fine. But seriously, aim for the ability to use T2 torpedoes, then flesh out the missile skills such as missile projection and missile bombardment.
  • All your ship support skills: Engineering, Electronics, Mechanic, Hull Upgrades, Navigation, Evasive Manoeuvres, Shield Operation, Shield Management,
  • EWAR specialist skills such as Sensor Linking to use remote sensor dampeners (which reduce your target's targeting range, meaning you can shoot them without them shooting you) and target painting (to make small targets take more damage from your torpedoes)


Hope this helps :)

Day 0 Advice for New Players
Victor Star
Imperial Academy
Amarr Empire
#6 - 2012-02-04 09:56:34 UTC
Thank you for help!

Petrus Blackshell wrote:
So far as Amarr ships go, you're somewhat stuck here. The Amarr by far prefer armor tanking over other sorts of tank, and there are very few good ways to use shield setups Amarr ships.

Why not to switch to another race ships?
AFAIK I can fly such ships without penalty if trained.

Stealth bomber is also a good idea, I'll try it before buying large cloaked ship.
Velicitia
XS Tech
#7 - 2012-02-04 15:04:53 UTC
Victor Star wrote:
Thank you for help!

Petrus Blackshell wrote:
So far as Amarr ships go, you're somewhat stuck here. The Amarr by far prefer armor tanking over other sorts of tank, and there are very few good ways to use shield setups Amarr ships.

Why not to switch to another race ships?
AFAIK I can fly such ships without penalty if trained.

Stealth bomber is also a good idea, I'll try it before buying large cloaked ship.


yes, you can do that. BUT it's a bad idea if you're a rookie looking to be "good" with it.

for example, it takes (about) 2-3 months to get the "recommended" certificates for a frigate ... which will put you at level 2-3 on most of the skills. Another month or so would see you in a good place for cruisers.

Now, you could jump out and go caldari (eww) if you wanted shield tanks instead of armour, but that means another 2-3 months (minimum) of the recommended skills for Caldari tank and weapon systems (though, since some certs/skills overlap, you might be able to be in a cruiser in 3 months)

so, 4-6 months into the game, and you're mediocre at armour tanks, energy weapons, shield tanks, hybrid weapons, and missiles... whereas if you stuck with one race, you'd most likely have L4 skills across the board, with a handful of L5 in the important places (e.g. core fitting, defence)

One of the bitter points of a good bittervet is the realisation that all those SP don't really do much, and that the newbie is having much more fun with what little he has. - Tippia
Petrus Blackshell
Rifterlings
#8 - 2012-02-04 17:13:42 UTC
Victor Star wrote:
Petrus Blackshell wrote:
So far as Amarr ships go, you're somewhat stuck here. The Amarr by far prefer armor tanking over other sorts of tank, and there are very few good ways to use shield setups Amarr ships.

Why not to switch to another race ships?
AFAIK I can fly such ships without penalty if trained.


You can fly them without penalty, yes, but your training gets weird once you decide to crosstrain another race. Some of the skills apply to the new ships, some weapon systems are still valid, but some might not be. You need to really know what you're doing, or spend a lot of time cross-training, or both.

I should know, I fly all four races of frigates and cruisers, and hardly any battleships (big ships are lame IMO).

Accidentally The Whole Frigate - For-newbies blog (currently on pause)
gfldex
#9 - 2012-02-04 19:09:04 UTC
Victor, mate, I have a question for you. What do you think is EVE about?

If you take all the sand out of the box, only the cat poo will remain.
Victor Star
Imperial Academy
Amarr Empire
#10 - 2012-02-05 09:56:36 UTC  |  Edited by: Victor Star
gfldex wrote:
Victor, mate, I have a question for you. What do you think is EVE about?

It's about having fun, isn't it? :)