Hello all,

I am about to start up this game again and I played for maybe a month a while back but had a few issues with the game at the time. After reading a lot about EvE more Ive decided to give it another go because I love SciFi and there are many aspects of EvE I really enjoy.

That being said I really like the idea of flying small faster ships and I primarily want to focus on that. When I played before I got bored out of mind running the same missions over and over. I noticed that many missions repeated and this made the game very monotonous to me.

As a new player what are some other things I should try to get involved in to make the game more fun. I feel that my issue with EvE is that there is so much to do, but I dont know what or how to do any of it. Im a Daoc, Wow guy that is tired of the spoon fed mmorpg but I find that I am having to relearn what an MMO can be because frankly those games ruined me I guess.

So basically I want to end up being in an interceptor or assault ship (minmatar) and I need to know what skills I should go after. Also I need to know what else I can do in this game to truly experience the game the way it is intended.

Thank you so much for the read,

Ezrindor

I think you are a nice victim for testing the brand new certificate system that is included in todays expansion.
When the server goes back online, just look into your charsheet and look at the certificates. Then have a look at the description of the jaguar, and look up the recommended certificates.

I cant find any info on the certificate thing what exactly is it?

Certificates is a new feature that will be deployed after todays patch. I don't know much about it myself. When the server comes back up, it will be more obvious what it's about.

They seem to be aimed at new players. A specialist tool of some sort, for you as an example. I don't know if it's skill based or earned.

It's designed to give new players some goals to skill for, while providing them with a useful skillset recommended for ships. It's basically a little help to get an overview on what skills affect which attribute, and what the actual effects of some of them are.

I would love to know if that feature actually helps. Feedback on the system from brand new players who are not yet spoiled by EveMon would be pretty nice for improvement/bugreports. ;)

Other than that, balance your attributes with a tad lower charisma in favour of perception, and then just skill for tech 2 small projectiles, a lot of speed skills, and some other ones suggested by the new tool.

Basically you specify a goal, in this case a Wolf or Jag AF; and the certificate will show you what supporting skills are needed in order to achieve your objective. Here is a link to the new features page. Scroll down to "certificates" and click on the corresponding image to see it visually.

well the certificate thing will help me with my path to what ship i want to be in....but other than missions what is there to do?

I'm in the same boat as the Original Poster, but im in the 14 day trial.

The impression I get, is it's more of a checklist of which skills to train. A collection of skills to accumulate to be certified for something. To help direct new players I guess...

Anyways, hope the server comes back on soon, I just got my first cruiser 10 minutes before it went down last night ........  Bad enough to wait 4 days to train Frigate IV & Cruiser III to get nailed with an expansion update.

I had the same story last year. Played 2 months and stopped playing. Year later I started again and playing for more then a year now. Word of advice: join a player corp! Even better would be to join a PVP corp (lowsec or 0.0). Once you loose a expensive ship (I lost a Mealstrom in the beginning) then the fun starts, you stop caring what ship you fly and if you loose it, it's just a game to have fun with. Battles are the most fun to do, even if you loose your ship in the end.

Edit: the new certificate system is something the players come up with. On the test server they had some certificates like   "Political incident" where the goal was to kill a friendly CEO in you alliance

It's always difficult to start and plan ahead in a sandbox game, so here's a few thoughts;

- make up your mind; PVP, PVE or industry. You can ofcourse diversify but at first you really want to focus on just one part. Once you know what you want to do then you can start focussing on specific parts and shiptypes

- put in effort; read, learn, ask, ask questions, question answers. This game caters for people who want to find solutions for problems instead of being passive and whining about them. The more effort you put in so you KNOW what you're doing the more fun the game will be.

- forget about the "I can't compete" idiocy, that's just a mindset, it really is. Ofcourse there are big ships you won't be able to fly within 18 months but EVE is not about setting a distant goal and then being annoyed the whole time trying to get there. "Once I am 70 and have T6 gear THEN I'll start having fun" is NOT what EVE is. Many people fall for that trap and most are unable to look beyond it. You can be viable and useful in a few weeks.

In your case, you want to fly small ships which kinda automatically means PVP. Small ship PVP comes in several flavours;

1) high sec piracy/can flipping; whatever moral attitude you might have towards it, it's profitable while relatively safe and a very good learning ground

2) low sec piracy; kinda difficult but doable to an extend

3) tackler for a corp/fleet; this can be anywhere from high sec to 0.0. This is where you'll learn and see the most, you'll meet people who can help you and you'll find how diverse combat and roles can be.

Whatever you do, I'd urge you to join a proper, active corp. Either go for a full PVP one right away or join something like EVE-University to train up a bit more, learn a whole lot before jumping into the fray. Skillwise you'll want the following

- good gunnery skills, this includes support skills for tracking, damage, range and all that. Also get up Weapon Upgrades, you don't neccesarily need Advanced weapon upgrades right away since Projectiles are easy on the fitting

- good cap skills, there's 2 base cap skills and you need em both at 4, then get the scram/web skill to at least lvl 3, MWD/AB cap usage skill you want to get up as well

- GOOD navigation skills, get that speed and agility up.

- GOOD armor tanking skills, forget about the passive idiot/EFT fits you see everywhere if you play solo, you need to tank the damage done to you.

Understand that while T2 ships are cool in case of Minmatar they're not always the best option, they're more specialised while having severe downsides. Moreso than any other race I found myself trying to shoehorn a T2 frigate into a role and then again come to the conclusion that the best frigate for the job is the Rifter. It's an awesome ship, don't let the non-T2 thingy fool you.

If you go into bigger ships then first thing I'd train up (oddly enough) is droneskills, BEFORE jumping into those bigger ships. Being able to use 5 T2 warriors or ECM drones is a neccesity and it also helps your PVEing, especially if you want to go to 0.0 and have to rat for your money. Forget about minnie BS for that, train up for a Dominix, takes a few days and you'll have a great belt ratter. But that is for future concern ofcourse.

Personally I only trained up turrets and armor tanking, i made the choice to not bother with shields and missiles. That makes your training much easier and more focussed and gives you the following ships; Rifter, Claw/(stiletto), Wolf, Rupture, Hurricane and Tempest. That's a nice lineup of ships.

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Originally posted by bigorgg
well the certificate thing will help me with my path to what ship i want to be in....but other than missions what is there to do?

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What about some pvp? You have the freedom to do what you want..

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Originally posted by bigorgg
well the certificate thing will help me with my path to what ship i want to be in....but other than missions what is there to do?

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I hate missions personally, mining as well so I don't do them. Heres a few out of a host of possibilities.

-Join a 0.0 corp and help carve out a portion of space(combat pilot, industrialist, researcher, spying, black ops, fleet commander, miner, ect ..ect). Good stealth and recon pilots are always needed. There are even all stealth pilot corps who contract out recon missions behind enemy lines to gather intel for a fee.

-Join the dark side. Become a feared and respected Pirate, assassin, scammer ..ect ..ect. Can be done solo(I was a solo pirate with less than 3 mil sp) but easier if in a corp. Solo REQUIRES a deeper understanding of game mechanics such as efficient use of the on board scanner and analyzing the statistics view of the star map to get kills and avoid nasty gate camps. The tools are available, its up to you to use them.

Join any corp low or high sec and help maintain and protect the player owned station(s). Engage in "economic PVP" with rival corps. With exploration you can probe out "rat complexes" in solar systems for profit. Join a mercenary corp and contract out you guns.

EVE is a canvas, your creativity and effort are the paint. Its a harsh game and those who don't survive are usually the ones who fail to use the tools provided and the head in their shoulders. Before you say "such and such is impossible" ask around in your corp(NOT the starter corp) or on the EVE forums if anyone else has done it. Often the reply will be "yes it can done". Ask how, follow the advice and execute.