Sorry for another n00b question. Is there anything useful for the other 2 character slots on my account? I can't really do much training for other characters, is it even worth the trouble to put characters there? I'd appreciate advice from veteran players.

For now not really. Later on you may want to buy an alt with isk for a specific task.

Originally posted by Lordmonkus

For now not really. Later on you may want to buy an alt with isk for a specific task.

Or you could just train one on a second account for a few months then pay for a transfer to your original account. I never liked the Idea of actually buying someones character from them.

i have a blueprint copy alt and a hauler alt, was considering a pos gunner alt or a cyno alt... theres loads of uses.

Originally posted by JGMIII

Originally posted by Lordmonkus

For now not really. Later on you may want to buy an alt with isk for a specific task.

 

Or you could just train one on a second account for a few months then pay for a transfer to your original account. I never liked the Idea of actually buying someones character from them.

This too. I have an alt that was a toon that belonged to a buddy that used to play, when he stopped I took him. Good little industrial character.

Originally posted by Xennith

i have a blueprint copy alt and a hauler alt, was considering a pos gunner alt or a cyno alt... theres loads of uses.

Wouldn't I be better off having my main character do all of this? I've followed the advice on learning skills first during my free trial so my main character can learn any skill faster than than an alt could. Unless I'm misreading the mechanics [which may well be, I'm a n00b] anything I can do with my other 2 slots I can do with my main character, and do it much faster as well.

A couple of you mentioned that I can transfer a character from another account. I didn't know this was possible. So, for example I can open a second account, train up a character on that account, transfer that character to one of the empty slots on my first account and then close the second account? Interesting.

 typo

Originally posted by JuJutsu

Originally posted by Xennith

i have a blueprint copy alt and a hauler alt, was considering a pos gunner alt or a cyno alt... theres loads of uses.

 

Wouldn't I be better off having my main character do all of this? I've followed the advice on learning skills first during my free trial so my main character can learn any skill faster than than an alt could. Unless I'm misreading the mechanics [which may well be, I'm a n00b] anything I can do with my other 2 slots I can do with my main character, and do it much faster as well.

This of course all depends on where your main is and where you want to be to do whatever it is that needs doing.

A couple of you mentioned that I can transfer a character from another account. I didn't know this was possible. So, for example I can open a second account, train up a character on that account, transfer that character to one of the empty slots on my first account and then close the second account? Interesting.

Correct.

 typo

i have a blueprint copy alt for example because its faster to train to have the basic lab slots skill to 5 than it is to train the advanced one up from 4 to 5, each character is capped to 10 lab slots max so having one maxed char and two lesser skilled chars doubles your slots quite easily.

having a hauler alt that is in an npc corp that cant be wardecced can be very useful.

a cyno alt is great because you put them in a tech 1 frig and if they get podded, you dont even need to get them a new clone because the basic one covers the skillpoints.

Originally posted by Xennith

i have a blueprint copy alt for example because its faster to train to have the basic lab slots skill to 5 than it is to train the advanced one up from 4 to 5, each character is capped to 10 lab slots max so having one maxed char and two lesser skilled chars doubles your slots quite easily.

having a hauler alt that is in an npc corp that cant be wardecced can be very useful.

a cyno alt is great because you put them in a tech 1 frig and if they get podded, you dont even need to get them a new clone because the basic one covers the skillpoints.

Ah. More food for thought. I've been playing MMOs for almost 9 years now and EVE is unlike anything I've ever seen. The more I learn, the more I don't know :)

ive played for three years now and know nothing about POS management, corp roles, capital ships and outposts. there are people who know nothing about industry or about combat, its such a deep game that nobody can know everything.

One thing you can do with them is place them at different trade hubs to check prices, or any area you want some kind of info on. They can serve as a pair of eyes on far away places.

Don't listen to anyone here whom is suggesting you train up an "alternative character" on the same account for active duties. Active duties involve Hauler Alts, Cyno Alts, ECM Alts, Mining Alts, Logistics alts etc etc. Active duty alts CANNOT BE USED while they are needed to support your main IF they are on the same account.

Many people here are suggesting ideas that would ONLY be useful if you had them on a 2nd account so you could PLAY THEM AT THE SAME TIME. The only use, as said above, for the multiple character slots on the same account would either be for Research or Industrial work like making ships, as you have caps on your skills for each industrial/lab slot per toon. The only other use for them is making a newer character portait for your main, and then paying the some $19-$30 bucks to swap it to your main toon. I've been tempted over the years to do the latter, but never actually felt like wasting that kind of mula on something so minor in the game.

Hope this helps you :)!

[Edit]: FarScape has a good bit of advice too, eyes in different regional markets is a handy tool. That's just about the ONLY use those extra character slots are good for, short of the industrial/R&D I mentioned above.

If you do not want to pay for an extra account, and since you cannot train two characters on the same account at the same time, I suggest finding what you like to do the most in the game and focus on that. That is only IF you do not want to pay for more than one account. Having more than one account though, is highly beneficial if used well.

i disagree with faded.

consider this, your alliance need a cyno putting up to jump a carrier to a station and dock it up. i dont worry about this, ill just use my cyno alt, if it gets podded i dont really care, if i used my main the clone cost would be about 4 mil.

your alliance has a pos under attack coming out of reinforced within the day, no worries, my posgunner never has any roles and so can hop into the owning corp immediatly, my main cant as i have hanger roles.

there are uses for alts on your main account, especially stuff like scouts or out of corp hauler alts. if you need more details and examples please ask.

If you live deep in 0.0 you need cyno alts all over the place.  It takes less then 1 week to train one up, put them in a small frig and let them sit in the system.

Cap pilots love to move minerals for you when you have cyno alts ready.

I know it is uncommon to do, but I actually have trained up on all of my 3 character slots, so instead of having one character with 85 mill skill points I got one with 40, another with 38 and a third with 17. All of them are very functional in the tasks they do.

Character 1 (38 mill SP): Does large scale mining, invention and production. Sells tech 2 items in major trade hubs and tech 1 in low sec in the factional warfare zones. Have few combat abilities (enough to handle level 3 missions in a Drake though), but can fly a freighter, transport ships and Hulks.

Character 2 (40 mill SP): Does level 4 missions, low sec exploration, gas mining and production/sale of synth boosters (that means running a low sec POS for the purpose). Have high combat abilities, fly tech 2 ships (frigates/cruisers/battleships) and is of course good at probing sites down.

Character 3 (17 mill SP): Does missions for NPC pirate factions and is more roleplayer oriented. Can fly black ops battleships and have decent combat abilities. Also like to engage unwary player targets of opertunity.

I did it for NPC standing management mostly as none of them has the same factional standings (one has of course negative security rating too). Another major reason is the possibility to quickly shift occupation when I want and not have the actions of one character interfere with the others. Handy if you are camped in, you can simply log in another character and do a different occupation without feeling gimped. In the times before jump clones this was especially handy.

I decided on this path many years ago and have never regretted it (even when I trained Learning skills on all of them).

EDIT: I later got a second account where I have made 3 other characters, that acts as support for my first 3 on a one-to-one basis.

TBH it's a tough call what to do with those spare 2 slots.  Personally I've trained up cyno/pos gunner alts on my spare slots so that if a corp/alliance mate needs a cyno somewhere I can hop on the alt, not risking my main, and pop a cyno for them.  Also, the pos gunner alts, if I ever venture back to 0.0 warfare, are quite fun for POS defense ;)

You can also train up trade alts and other alts in just a couple months time.  My 'main' character is now at a point where I generally don't mind taking a few days off his training now and then to work on my alts.  It's not something you'll likely want to do early on.  But eventually you're going to reach a point where taking a week or two off to train an alt that's good at something you have no real use, or desire, for on your main is do-able.

You also, of course, have the option of obtaining a second account and training alts on that and transferring them over, but frankly once you have that second character you'll probably wind up not wanting to take time away from it either and will wind up keeping the alt account ;)

And, as someone mentioned, there's always the possibility of buying alts with isk and having them added to your account.  This is only for the 'rich and wealthy' though as they start in the 'hundreds of millions' of isk and range into the 'tens of billions' of isk in price.

Originally posted by JuJutsu

Originally posted by Xennith

i have a blueprint copy alt and a hauler alt, was considering a pos gunner alt or a cyno alt... theres loads of uses.

 

Wouldn't I be better off having my main character do all of this? I've followed the advice on learning skills first during my free trial so my main character can learn any skill faster than than an alt could. Unless I'm misreading the mechanics [which may well be, I'm a n00b] anything I can do with my other 2 slots I can do with my main character, and do it much faster as well.

A couple of you mentioned that I can transfer a character from another account. I didn't know this was possible. So, for example I can open a second account, train up a character on that account, transfer that character to one of the empty slots on my first account and then close the second account? Interesting.

 typo

Yes you could/can train anything on your main (1st) character, and with learnings they will be reasonably quick to train, but training a 2nd slot for a specific purpose, or seperate 0.0/hisec playstyles is quite common

e.g.  training an alt for mining OP hauling (friagte 3 + Industrial 4/5) takes very little time, and would most likely only see occasional use.

Transfering your own alt from a 2nd account, or purchasing 1 off the eve forums is all dealt with under "account management" and CCP charge a 1 off fee (€20) for it.