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New dev blog: The Ease of EVE

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CCP Legion
#61 - 2012-02-17 14:49:27 UTC
This is good stuff, keep it coming :)


Kelduum Revaan wrote:
Ok, this could be a VERY long post, but I'll just make a few points:

1. Get someone who has played other MMOs/PC Games, but never played EVE, to sit down and run the existing tutorials. Record them doing so. Get them to ask questions. Use *that* feedback to improve it.


We have done a lot of this (even used my wife as a guinea pig) and the feedback from these is extremely valuable.

Stephanie Nevaeh wrote:
. Silly I know but its the little newbie worrys like that that are an issue for players like me.

All in all the tutorials are excellent as long as one listens, reads and pays attention to what is required.


Not silly at all, seeing as 99% of new players have those same concerns. Something we want to address is the amount of confusing moment the players face, especially in the first few hours.

The current tutorial does a decent job in teaching you the basics, assuming you do not deviate at all from what it says and tells you to do. Good to see some people enjoying them, but how many people would define the tutorial and career agents as fun?

Yanaoo wrote:
One thing my girlfriend who is starting out her journey into EVE said, and it just made total sense to me:

"Why are there no general descriptions of cruisers, frigates, battlecruisers etc.?"


A good example of something that experienced players can see as being obvious, but its another thing that isn't actually explained anywhere properly and can hence increase the 'im lost' feeling.

@CCP_Legion | Producer
CCP Legion
#62 - 2012-02-17 14:50:02 UTC
DeBingJos wrote:

New players need to be told how to look for a good corp in detail. ( recruitment channel, forums, the new corp finder, they all need to be explained in detail. )


This is something which is a huge issue. Players can get a lot more out of EVE in corps and playing with other people, it is something we want to press sooner rather than later.

Halycon Gamma wrote:

I am of the opinion that you can teach them everything in the game through a tutorial without "dumbing down" the game. Teaching them how PI works inside a tutorial doesn't make PI any easier, it just makes it accessable. Teaching them how to survive in a wormhole doesn't make a wormhole any easier, it just makes it more accessable.


This.

Taedrin wrote:

My main gripe is that new players are only introduced to a relatively small portion of EVE's gameplay.


Very true. Your points go a lot hand in hand as getting people into corps means they are exposed to a much wider portion of the game.

Destination SkillQueue wrote:

Finally, show don't tell. Block of text isn't going to stay with anyone the first time they play. Show any way you can.


This video is an example of something I would like to see in the actual tutorial experience. There are more specific ones coming as well and hopefully at some point we can indeed show things more visually within the game, instead of just text.

@CCP_Legion | Producer
Biterno Sintaph
Reboot Required
#63 - 2012-02-17 14:52:31 UTC
I think the biggest problem with EVE's NPE is that it explains what to do, but it rarely explains the why. So much of EVE revolves around the metagame. People without the metagame context (newbies) are at a huge disadvantage compared to those of us who've played for a while.

Duh, of course newbies don't know anything. However, I think the big problem in EVE is that the barrier to learning the metagame is so high. If I PvP in **** gear in WoW, I lose the battleground and respawn with all my gear. In EVE, I PvP in a shitfit and lose my investment completely. I may have learned a little bit through that experience, but I now have to grind ISK again to try something else.

Associated with this is the idea that "bigger ship means better ship", which a lot of players will carry over from their other MMO experience. Clearly battleships are better than cruisers, because they're for "higher level" characters. That may be the idea, but the EVE meta says otherwise. The EVE meta says "depending on the situation".

We need to bring these new users up to speed on the metagame. A lot of these things are things that get explained from one player to another when they join a player run corp through corp fittings, fleet doctrines, etc. Take a look at what E-UNI and other noob-friendly corps have on their training list.

For example, here's some ideas on ship fitting:

- All EVE players need a sandbox in which to safely build ship fits and see how one module or skill affects another module or skill. EFT features need to be incorporated in-game or players need to know where to get EFT. It's invaluable.
- Players need to be taught common fit techniques, like why you fit a MWD on a ship that uses blasters.
- Players need to be taught how to fly their ships in ways that mesh with the ship role. Up close and personal? MWD in and orbit close. Sniper boat? Warp to 100 and fire from there.
Indahmawar Fazmarai
#64 - 2012-02-17 14:56:52 UTC  |  Edited by: Indahmawar Fazmarai
Well, i will tell the feedback I gathered from my attempts to recruit new players... all of them failed.

- Language barrier. EVE is VERY complex, new players must acquire lots of information and google-translate will only take you so far. Not just EVE, but also 3d party apps such as EVEmon or EVE Fitting Tool, and resources such as Battleclinic fittings or EVE Survival's mission guides...

- EVE can litherally devour your time schedule. One of my guests liked the game a lot but didn't wanted to get hooked to playing 6 hours a day again... i tried to sell him solo PvE as a more casual activity, but then it' s not terribly fun nor interesting

- Early griefing. The warnings about can flipping, gate camping, lowsec asteroid belts and so were a bit discouraging.

- Finding friends... probably was a strike of bad luck, but none of my guests could find a helpful hand at the Spanish chat channel when they needed. And Help channel is useless without a good grasp of English, provided how fast it moves

- Jita contract madness. One of my guests thought that the chat channel in Jita would be of use if he could ask for stuff there rather than be spammed to death by the same few spambots.

- The character creator is terribly cool, but, finding out that the human avatar is useless makes the game look unfinished or broken. One of my guest asked about opening the door (yikes).
Vegare
Bitslix
Lolsec Fockel
#65 - 2012-02-17 15:14:13 UTC  |  Edited by: Vegare
Make sure a newbie is told repeatedly that he has to set his own goals. They do really need to understand that eve is different in that regard. 'Dare to be bold, pilot' just doesn't cut it.

On a related note: new players who have been drawn in by the new EvE website will be asking: 'So when can i choose my profession, already? I'd really like to play a 'bounty hunter'.'
Schmata Bastanold
In Boobiez We Trust
#66 - 2012-02-17 15:14:19 UTC
Few years ago I played a little some game from "conquer galaxy, build your empire, sent war fleets, etc" genre. It was kind of RTS but in space with universe divided into systems and all that stuff that is not important right now.

One of gameplay parts was building space ships from modules, something like Eve T3 in concept. And what was very cool about it you had simulator in which you could test your designs. You selected ship A which you commanded and ship B as your opponent and start simulation. Ship B was commanded by computer and it of course tried to get your ship. You could test range of gunz, agility, rate of fire, basically you could more or less feel how your design is doing in fight situation and what you could improve to make it more agile for example to avoid bigger ships fire.

Somebody earlier mentioned explaining fitting concepts as a part of NPE. Maybe such simulator for our fittings could be incorporated into fitting tool and it could greatly serve as part of tutorial for newbies but also as a cheap option to test fits for more experienced player too. Of course it would be kind of like checking fits on rats so not really pvp test drive replacement but since you could specify "rats" using your selected fit it could be quite useful for experimenting with not cookie fittings.

Just an idea, don't pod me :)

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Kapradian
Mabo Land Rights
#67 - 2012-02-17 15:15:07 UTC
This is a topic I am extremely passionate about.
I have spent 90% of my EvE time in Low Sec, Training New players and Griefing High Sec Care Bares.
I love this game (tho did take a 2 year break) and have had 9 friends join with only 1 stay (all stayed longer than their Trial account).

Why my friends left EvE:
1) Ganked in High Sec
2) Ganked in High Sec
3) Ganked in High Sec
4) Ganked in High Sec
5) PvE missions are boring as all hell
6) PvE missions are boring as all hell
7) PvE missions are boring as all hell
8) He was a social ****** and pissed off all his corp mates :P
9) Too hard to find any PvP fun.

a) High Sec and Low Sec PvP needs to be fixed. There needs to be a PvP system that is more encouraging to new players (Faction war and Low Sec are worse than most Null).
c) Remove the crap PvE content, just adding more interesting PvE content is NOT a solution. New players will start playing the crap missions and presume that is the quality of the game.
d) Fix the damn UI…. nuff said.
Daedra Blue
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#68 - 2012-02-17 15:16:25 UTC  |  Edited by: Daedra Blue
Here's a refined example of my previous post:

Numbers don't represent actual value its not my job to make the statistics.

Gallente -> Insert iconic ship - let them spin it - SS of other iconic ships that emphasize the design theme - Show turrets fire!!
STATS - Mainly Armor Tanked as defensive measures (Tooltip Armor has a weakness to explosive dmg and does not passively regenerate)
- Close range to mid range
- High dmg weapons
- Very energy hungry Weapons
- Turret Damage inflexible - Thermal and Kinetic
- Good Drone orientation (Drones have flexible dmg - all dmg types)
- Turret type DMG - Explanation of turret mechanics

Caldari -> Insert iconic ship - let them spin it - SS of other iconic ships that emphasize the design theme - Show missiles fire!!
STATS - Mainly Shield Tanked as defensive measures (Shield does regenerate passively weakness to EM dmg)
- Close to Long Range
- Medium dmg weapons
- Consumes no energy for weapons
- Missiles have flexible dmg - all dmg types (Perk - auto-aiming rockets!)
- Poor Drone orientation (Drones have flexible dmg - all dmg types)
- Launcher type DMG - Explanation of launcher mechanics

Amar -> Insert iconic ship - let them spin it - SS of other iconic ships that emphasize the design theme - Show lazorz fire!!
STATS - Shield and Armor tanked -> affinity to armor. (Shield does regenerate passively weakness to EM dmg) (Tooltip Armor has a weakness to explosive dmg and does not passively regenerate)
- Close to Long Range
- Medium dmg weapons
- Very high energy consumtion for weapons
- Lazorz have inflexible dmg - EM and Thermal
- Fair Drone orientation (Drones have flexible dmg - all dmg types)
- Turret type DMG - Explanation of turret mechanics

Minmatar -> Insert iconic ship - let them spin it - SS of other iconic ships that emphasize the design theme - Show projectiles fire!!
STATS - Shield and Armor tanked -> affinity to shield. (Shield does regenerate passively weakness to EM dmg) (Tooltip Armor has a weakness to explosive dmg and does not passively regenerate)
- Close to Long Range
- Medium dmg weapons
- No energy consumtion for weapons
- Projectiles have Partial dmg flexibility - 50%Kinetic / 50% all dmg type.
- Fair Drone orientation (Drones have flexible dmg - all dmg types)
- Turret type DMG - Explanation of turret mechanics

Thx for the correction.
Schmata Bastanold
In Boobiez We Trust
#69 - 2012-02-17 15:18:54 UTC
Daedra Blue wrote:
Minmatar -> Insert iconic ship - let them spin it - SS of other iconic ships that emphasize the design theme - Show projectiles fire!!


Fixed that for ya :)

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Callic Veratar
#70 - 2012-02-17 15:19:00 UTC
I was taught how to passive shield tank a ship by a corp mate. Soon followed by analyzing other fits to see the modules that go together. The game does nothing at the moment to explain how to fit a ship well and the market is really convoluted if you don't know what you're looking for.

For every module there should be two tabs in "show info":

Synergy:
Lists all the modules, rigs, and skill in the game that help a module work better. For example, shield boosters go with shield boost amps, shield hardeners, and capacitor flux coils as well as shield compensation and shield operation.

Penalty:
Lists all the modules and rigs in the game that penalize a module. Again with shield boosters, you may list capacitor power relays.


Ideally, these pages would be built automatically and cached so that devs don't need to update every module that is affected by a tweak.

The idea behind these is that during the tutorial I can be given a shield recharger, then told to look at the bonus and penalty pages add the synergies and avoid the conflicts. On top of that, another page could then point to the variations pages and explain that the further down you go the better the modules get.

Without this information I had wonderful fits that included an afterburner, shield booster, armor repper, hull repper, and a smack of other things I thought I might need.
Omega Tron
Edge Dancers
Pan-Intergalatic Business Community
#71 - 2012-02-17 15:23:59 UTC
I would like to offer CCP Legion and team a different point of view from those I've seen so far in this forum. I came to EVE 4 years ago after reading an article that I came across. Until then I had tried a couple of MMO trials that were all lock step's to the designers thinking and objectives. I hated them. So what got me hooked was the fact that the writer went on and on about how hard and tough EVE was, the learning curve was wicked, and that you needed to do so much reading and studying and the background stories were complex and .... well I think you are beginning to see my point. I would like you to consider the idea that there is one thing that is like cat nip to all gamers and that is a challenge. "Are you a good enough gamer to play EVE?" I think you need to drive home in marketing and advertising that challenge but do not do that in the game with the tutorials or game play. I have done the new tutorials all of them. And in my opinion they are good enough when compared to the single one I did 4 years ago. Just need to do a better explanation tutorial about looking for a corporation that the Nob needs to find at the end of the tutorials or they may make the choice to remain in the NPC they are assigned too. Get rid of the 11% penalty for staying in a NPC for the Nob for their first year in the game. It is my view that EVE being a hard, tough game is why it is still here after 8 years and going forward in to the future. OK, now it's everyone's turn to point out how screwed up my thinking and opinions are...

CCP's sand box is EVE Online.  The sand is owned by CCP.  We pay them a monthly fee to throw the sand at each other.  That is all that is here, so move along. Nothing more to be seen.
Zothike
State War Academy
Caldari State
#72 - 2012-02-17 15:32:28 UTC
Perhaps the possibility if it's really "the very first time" player could chose to enter a closed tutorial like in Age of Conan, with limited contact or perhaps even without any other player interaction (out of channels ) to avoid bad "first experience" being scammed, ganked, trolled during the x first hours of play...
Schmata Bastanold
In Boobiez We Trust
#73 - 2012-02-17 15:39:17 UTC
Another thing that could improve immersion of new players could be implementing Evemon and EFT/Evehq into game. To be honest it is kinda strange that 3rd party tools give you MOAR better info and functionality than actual game.

Whenever subject of allowing manipulation of a skill queue from outside of Eve shows up arguments against it (or rather why CCP won't do it) is: to make people log in because there is a chance that they won't just update training queue but also go out to help a friend in need or sth else that will keep them in game longer.

So why to plan your progress and experiment with your fitting you have to go out of a game? Kinda strange approach.

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Callic Veratar
#74 - 2012-02-17 15:39:25 UTC
There are a lot of unwritten rules that, as a pilot of almost 3 years, I still can't find a clear place that explains them IN GAME. The only way to find answers to these questions is to go on Google or ask local and hope for the best, where the answers are usually conflicting, out of date, or just wrong.

- Which capitals use gates and which can't?
- Why can't I compress ore in a station? How do I compress ore?
- Where can I buy a T2 BPO?
- How do I use jump drive? Can I use jump drive in high sec?
- How do I build a dreadnaught?
- How do I build a T3 cruiser?
- What is gas used for?
- How do I anchor a starbase in high sec?
- Can I use bombs or bubbles in low sec?
rodyas
Tie Fighters Inc
#75 - 2012-02-17 15:42:00 UTC
The main thing I noticed that seemed difficult is, how many trees are needed to fly a decent ship. Fitting, tank, dps, drones, navigation, spaceship command. A new player cant lvl one of these and do well, he has to lvl all 6 at once to do well. Fitting goes with that, a new player would have to lvl all 6 trees at once to have balance then fits would work better.

I was gonna give advice to my friends if they played, was to start an account, but dont play. Lvl for 3-6 months or so, then start playing the game. Its just really hard to beat that chunk of SP ya need before a spaceship takes shape.

Signature removed for inappropriate language - CCP Eterne
Seismic Stan
Freebooted Junkworks
#76 - 2012-02-17 15:43:02 UTC  |  Edited by: Seismic Stan
I've just kicked off a Blog Banter on this subject so hopefully we'll get a few walls-of-text from a variety of backgrounds.

I'll link all the entries here for your convenience.

Blog Banter 33: The Capsuleer Experience

EVE Online: The Text Adventure --- GameSkinny Correspondent --- Freebooted Blogger
Omnicide Incarnate
Doomheim
#77 - 2012-02-17 15:57:01 UTC
I think the tutorials based on professions are a bit misleading. The NPE should teach players professions that can really make them some money...

Salvaging - Why not teach them how to ninja salvage rather than just salvage, ninja salvaging is somewhat more profitable.

Manufacturing - Honestly this is only profitable nowadays if you are a small cog in a huge machine or if you are able to do it in dangerous space.

Exploration- There is a great blog, talking about how someone made tons of money in with a new char doing this: http://explorationalmanac.blogspot.com/ but I was unable to achieve the same results, and high sec exploration is very crowded by high skilled players.

Combat - You cant make money in PvP just saying it right there sure, there are mercenary corps, sure u can suicide gank with at least a second account, but I have found no way a single character can reliably make money from PvP. Fix the bounty system maybe? Somehow make it possible to kill a character that just sits in station, or who had their account go inactive after having a bounty placed on it?

These things dont necessarily need to be fixed, the tutorials simply need to be refocused to things that a new character can actually do, and make money in... in my humble opinion.

As an afterthought, the combat missions end with an npc inviting the player to 0.0, I tried to do this after the epic arcs came out, made a trial character, did the combat tutorials and the SoE arc, then bought him a dramiel and went to 0.0... died, bought him another dramiel... died again, deactivated that account. And I wasn't even a noob.

More support for alternative playstyles like NPC Space solo pirate would be great, rebalance all of the pirate missions to be like the epic arcs (as in doable by frigs) running level 4 missions in a rifter to buy machariels would be amazing...
Jada Maroo
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#78 - 2012-02-17 16:07:31 UTC
My research indicates that new players lose interest in Eve when they learn a billion isk an hour aren't being spontaneously created in Jada Maroo's wallet. It's such a simple feature, really, and has been overlooked for years. It's a remarkable sign of laziness on CCP's part.
Eclavaldra
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#79 - 2012-02-17 16:11:04 UTC
I started on EVE in 2006 with 5 mates, now only I still play.

Where did they go?

One left after several months for the usual combination of RL getting in the way / difficulty justifying the money for a subscription.



And the others? They ALL left after various types of high-sec ganking: can-flipping, our fledgling corp being wardecced, that sort of thing.

It's pretty straightforward:

Killing newbies is griefing pure and simple (how can it possibly be anything else?).
Griefing newbies pisses them off.
Pissed-off newbies leave EVE and go play some other MMO.
Bottom line: Allowing newbies to be killed when they (reasonably) thought that 1.0 was safe costs CCP player accounts.

Some people - a lot in fact - want to play in the sandbox without having what they've built kicked over by someone else "for the lols" or because "Carebear tears taste the sweetest." Despite the fact that all the shiny stuff only drops / exists in Lowsec something like two thirds of EVE players nevertheless stay in high sec . Hey CCP: Woo Woo! All aboard the Clue Train!

Make all the starter systems and their neighbours 1.0 (if they aren't already).
Make 1.0 mean what new players think it means. No wardecs, no can-flipping, no suicide ganking... No shooty-shooting the little noobies, kapish?

Give them a nice big area of safeness to get to grips with the game in - it's hard enough without assholes shooting at them for no better reason than because they can.
Tas Nok
Hedion University
Amarr Empire
#80 - 2012-02-17 16:12:09 UTC
So far lots of good posts with quite a few suggestions...

Back in '07 was when I first tried eve and NPE was pretty awful, after about a month I was doing a random courier mission but I had already set AP to just ignore LS warnings.... I think I went away to grab something to drink and came back to find my pod floating next to a gate in LS... I quit shortly after because I was really annoyed at how easily I had died, and thought I had no chance of ever being able to compete.

Couple months later I came back after having read nearly everything I could get my hands on OOG and I started my current main, joined my first corp after about 6mo of grinding and boredom and basically never looked back...

Key points (some already suggested in other posts)

* playing and learning alone really sucks...takes forever and your fits will be fail, sadly the rookie channels are so chaotic I can't see vets using them to consistently help, perhaps pair up (group up) noobs in a few early missions so they can see the benefits of teamwork?
* gotta introduce them to the joys/sadness of getting ganked and being the ganker... I'd actually make this a key mission where you join a small group of 3 ship and go to war vs another group of 3 (all noob-ships) the winners move on quickly... the losers are invited to learn from their mistakes to become better or to avoid unwanted pvp (a properly tanked hulk with the right skills will survive almost any gank, but if they only focus on indy skills they are meat every time)
* I personally have killed and podded a few noobs in WH space who died horribly and quit because they really had no understanding of probe mechanics, wh-space or the differences in why is so dangerous for new players... some intro to null-mechanics in the NPE would be helpful.
* gotta remind them all.. Concord is there to Punish AFTER the fact, not protect BEFORE
* they might be noobs, but I cannot lock and bring DPS to bear if one of our noobs hasn't already pointed and webbed them... the really cool toys are hard to get into, but EVERYONE is useful after about a week of training if you have a clue.
* under a certain threshold CCP needs to be willing to help folks along early on.. 90 days in game, under 2 mil SP... whatever, but losing it all so early on is devastating... (yes its better to teach them early... but might be better to reimburse their 1st awful loss, with a stern warning... " next time, you are on your own, try not to die" ) simply have a counter on the character page for 1 free reimbursement... which will automatically disappear after 5m SP or 90 days in game (or 200 hours of actual game-time)