PVE: Public Venture Enterprises

Eggs And Grandmothers

2009-07-23T12:14:00.000+01:00

Something I notice a lot on the forums and in the help channels is a failure on the part of those who are, perfectly rightfully and with the best intentions, trying to help new players to take into account the age of the character asking a question.

Some players that you personally may not have met before may have a massive amount of ingame knowledge that you don't have, and providing basic information to them when misunderstanding their question or their need for an answer is going to be at best a waste of your time and at worst come across as patronising and offensive. Equally giving a high level answer to someone who is new to the game may well be confusing.

Sometimes this is unavoidable, but a few simple questions and a tiny bit of research on your part will help to target your replies more quickly.

To see how long a player has been ingame look at the player profile, at their employment history. Scroll down and look at the first date mentioned, This is when they came into the game. You can also look at security status and standings to see if thay have actually been active in that time (remember strongly negative security status is as much of an indication of activity as positive).

If someone has been in the game a while and is asking an apparently simple questions, or hasn't done something you think is obvious, try a short, pithy reminder. If that doesn't work and they express some further lack of understanding by all means launch into a full explanation, perhaps questioning if they have been out of the game a while to get to know them better.

Merger

2009-07-21T13:56:00.002+01:00

Public venture Enterprises has moved its PVE operations to Angelic Industries. We look forward to working within the larger corporation and hope the corporation will continue to grow and thrive to become the first choice for an Eve industrialist.

Probe signals overload

2009-03-28T19:10:00.001Z

Polaris Frigate

2009-03-23T22:22:00.002Z

Sat On A Rokh

2009-02-22T21:50:00.001Z

PVE Forum

2009-02-13T06:06:00.002Z

After a long time resisting doing so I'm putting up a forum. Currently in test mode corp members can register here in preparation for it going live.

Paid Positions Available

2008-12-06T13:45:00.007Z

With immediate effect I am instituting a policy of paid positions within the corp. Current Vacancies are:

Mining Director/s: 50% of mined min value OR 20% of corp profits per week
Required: Be able to fly at least a Hulk, Preferably also an Orca.
Preferable: Real life people management skills and experience.

PVP Directors / Trainers: 20% of corp profits after expenses per week
Required: High level of combat skills, including ewar, Leadership skills, Fleet combat experience.
Preferable: Fleet combat Leadership experience, Pirating/Merc experience, RL administration skills.

PVP combat/scouts: 5 mill isk per hour plus medals for successful engagements.
Required: Able to use Warp disruptors, Webbers, ECM.
Preferred: Able to use T2 weapons, full account.

Salvagers: 10mill isk per hour
Required: Dedicated salvage ship (at least destroyer) able to use tractors, ab, and salvagers.

Recruiters: 5mill isk per verified new member on a full account.

New members are welcome to join pending qualification, 1mill isk paid to help with skillbook costs, and general game help always available.
Miner1, pvp scout and salvager positions are all trainable for within a week, so open to trial accounts.

To apply: Our headquarters is in Kisogo State War Academy. Look us up in the list of Headquarters in station and click apply. If someone invited you please state their name in the application.

If Kisogo is far from you we have a number of other offices, ask a member for details of your nearest office.

New Character Creation Guide - The long version

2008-11-04T13:13:00.003Z

By Akita T

1. Introduction

One thing you should always remember: it DOES NOT matter what race, bloodline and ancestry you pick, you can end up training the same things everybody else can train.
Given enough time, you can even train each and every skill in the game to level 5... well, it will take a couple of decades to do it, but you get the idea.

The only difference between characters (other than the portrait) is HOW FAST you train those skills.
The formula is pretty simple: every minute, you get a certain amount of skillpoints equal to "primary" attribute score plus half of "secondary" attribute score.

So, for example, if you train a skill that has Perception primary and Willpower secondary (most ship and weapon skills have that combination), and if your character has currently 16.50 PER and 11.00 WIL, you will be getting 22 SP per minute (or 1320 SP per hour, or 31680 SP per day).

Every character starts with 39 "base" attribute points, 34 of which are determined by race, bloodline and ancestry, while the other 5 can be manually distributed (no more than 3 of the 5 points on a single attribute though).
The average BASE attribute value is therefore 39/5=7.8

Recently, you also get "free learning skills" depending on school picked (military, bussiness or industry), with one L4 and one L2 "+1 per level attribute boosting" skill already trained, on top of some levels in "learning" (+2% to all attributes per level).

AT MOST, with all basic and advanced learning skills trained up to L5 (takes a very long time), and with +5 implants plugged in (very expensive to get, also need L5 in Cybernetics to use), you can get +15 to each base attribute, for a total of 39+5*15=114 attribute points, and with L5 learning it's 114*1.1=125.4 total maximum possible attribute sum.
The "maximum" average is therefore (7.8+15)*1.1=25.08

NOTE: In-game, an attribute value of (for instance) 20.90 is still DISPLAYED as "20", even if the influence on training is almost the same as having a "true" value of 21.

2. What race/bloodline/ancestry should I pick ?

First of all, you have to consider the following fact:
you CAN NOT change your choice once you created your character.

Even if you change the portrait, it NEEDS to be of the same bloodline and gender as the initially chosen character.
So, for instance, even if you are attracted by the Caldari Achura attributes, the male Achura portraits are probably the ugliest-looking ones around. Some people actually refuse to create an Achura character because of that (true story).

Also, the "roleplay" element is pretty important, so you might want a certain race, or even a certain bloodline for RP reasons rather than aesthetic or practical ones.

Considering the learning skills level the playing field pretty much in the long run, you might consider picking a "suboptimal" character of your desired race/bloodline simply because you like the way they look or just love their background story.

You will probably have a much tougher start and a slower overall progress, but at least you won't hate your own in-game face.

This guide will let you quickly browse through various stats, so you can make an informed guess with minimal effort as to what bloodline best accomodates not only your "need for effectiveness" but also visual appeal and even roleplay elements.

The final choice is yours, and if you really, really want to pick the worst possible long-term combo just because you love the face/story, it's your right to do so.
Realistically speaking, long-term, you will only be about 20% behind the rest that picked "the best combo", so it's not a disaster.

3. So is there such a thing as a "good" and "bad" pick ?

The long version involves lengthy talks about specialized characters and limited training time, a discution that mainly concerns alts (secondary/alternate characters, built for specific purposes). Also, such "alts" will usually rely on funding from the "main" in the early days, so it's even less of an issue for them.

The short version (so, for genuine new players) is YES, there is such a thing as "good" vs "bad" choices.
The reason is pretty simple, actually.

A "primary" (or sole) character will grow and become self-sustainable in a reasonable timespan only if you have a reasonably well-rounded selection of skills.
You can't trade without ISK reserves, you need to run missions or mine to acquire ISK in the early days, you also need to devote as much as possible time to perfecting the learning skills.
Well, at least once you have enough skills done to cover your "moneymaking" needs, that is... DO NOT start training advanced learnings or something like that before you have a decent capital aquiring method, or else you will suffer.

Basically, you need a decent starter attribute spread that will not stiffle your later growth, while still providing you with a decent amount of "oomph" in the early phase.

You will want to get as little charisma as possible, because there's simply not much to train (and especially not to L5) that requires charisma (neither as primary nor as secondary) early on.
The next attribute you shouldn't care too much about is willpower. Willpower is a secondary attribute in spaceship command and weapon skills, so you should only minimize it (if at all possible) when you have a very high perception.
Memory is not only a secondary attribute in support skills, but also primary in the basic learnings and drones (alongside, you guessed it, perception).
Intelligence is also a very important attribute, primary in all support skills and science, and secondary in basic learning.

So your "attribute importance order" is:
PER >= INT >= MEM >= WIL >>> CHA

4. The tables, the raw figures, the math behind it.

I have created a (rather objective, even if not obvious at first sight) "overall score" for each of the 36 possible ancestry choices, based on the discussed issues.

The exact formula used is rather irrelevant, but for the reference, it is :
((10*per+9*int+5*mem+4*wil+cha)*(2*per+2*int+mem-cha)-3114)/652.1
A score of "8" vs a score of "1" does NOT mean the choice is eight times better, it's only a relative indication of "versatility" and "ease of use", on a scale of 10 (most versatile) to 0 (least versatile).

race	bloodline	ancestry	PER	INT	MEM	WIL	CHA	OVERALL

Caldari	achura	invent	7	12	6	6	3	10.0
Caldari	achura	stargaz	8	8	9	6	3	8.3
Caldari	achura	monk	9	8	6	8	3	8.
Amarr	khanid	cyberkn	11	6	4	8	5	6.4
Caldari	deteis	scienti	6	10	7	5	6	5.9
Minmatar	sebiestor	tinker	5	11	6	6	6	5.5
Amarr	nikunni	bordrun	10	6	6	4	8	4.8
Minmatar	sebiestor	rebel	8	7	6	7	6	4.7
Caldari	civire	entrep	9	5	8	6	6	4.7
Minmatar	vherokior	drifter	6	9	8	3	8	4.5
Minmatar	brutor	slave	11	4	4	9	6	4.2
Gallente	Gallente	immigr	10	6	4	6	8	4.1
Gallente	jin-mei	jing ko	10	5	5	7	7	4.0
Caldari	deteis	mercha	5	7	11	5	6	3.9
Minmatar	brutor	worker	9	4	8	7	6	3.8
Gallente	Gallente	miner	8	6	8	4	8	3.7
Amarr	khanid	union	8	7	4	8	7	3.6
Amarr	khanid	zealot	8	5	6	10	5	3.5
Caldari	civire	merc	9	5	4	10	6	3.2
Amarr	Amarr	wealthy	4	7	9	10	4	3.2
Gallente	intaki	reborn	3	8	11	6	6	3.0
Gallente	jin-mei	saan go	6	7	7	7	7	2.9
Amarr	Amarr	relig	4	7	6	14	3	2.6
Caldari	deteis	tubech	5	7	7	9	6	2.5
Gallente	intaki	artist	5	8	7	6	8	2.5
Caldari	civire	disse	9	5	4	8	8	2.4
Minmatar	brutor	tribal	9	4	4	10	7	2.0
Minmatar	vherokior	mystic	4	8	8	6	8	2.0
Minmatar	vherokior	retail	4	7	11	3	9	1.8
Amarr	nikunni	navyvet	7	5	6	8	8	1.5
Amarr	Amarr	liberal	4	7	6	11	6	1.4
Gallente	Gallente	activis	8	6	4	4	12	0.8
Minmatar	sebiestor	trader	5	7	6	6	10	0.7
Gallente	jin-mei	sang do	6	5	5	10	8	0.4
Gallente	intaki	diplom	3	8	7	6	10	0.2
Amarr	nikunni	frmerc	7	5	6	4	12	0.0

P.S. Due to constant questions about this listing above, clearning up a few confusions...

The above list covers "versatility".
Versatility does NOT mean "this is the best character you can pick".
It only means "this is the LEAST BAD character you can pick OVERALL if you have no idea what you'll be doing".
It's a table made for the persons who never played EVE before, who have no clue what to pick for their first character, and even less of a clue about what they'll want to do later on in the game.
Yes, it could mean that if you do pick the most extreme and unlikely job, this "overall least worst" choice could mean you actually got one of the worst choices, so it's not a win/win situation.

HOWEVER

If you KNOW EXACTLY what you want to be or do, and you have your skillplan mapped out for years to come, then this table above is useless to you.
What you want to do instead is get EVE-HQ, plug in that skillplan, and let the program pick the best race/bloodline/school and even the custom skillpoint distribution for you (it actually calculates just about every combination, but you sort by completion time and pick one of those with the lowest optimal completion times).

5. So what does that mean and what should I do ?

Basically, go from top to bottom of this list and pick the highest on the list that appeals to you.

Then, distribute the 5 "custom" points either to alleviate some problems in certain departments (depends a lot on your initial bloodline/ancestry choice).

Or, you can simply boost perception, intelligence and even memory : 3P/2I, 2P/2I/1M and even 3I/2M are very popular choices regardless of bloodline.

Once "in", train whatever helps you make ISK faster, MAKE some ISK fast, then buy the remaining learning skills (you only have 3 of the 6 basics, and you could already train one advanced, but it costs 4.5 mil ISK, money better spent on a cruiser in the first days).
Train all learning skills to L2, the very least, in the first day. Try to get most (if not all) of them to L3 in the first 2-3 days.
Getting L3 science and then L1 cybernetics, plugging in a set of (cheap) +1 implants is also a very good idea.

REMEMBER to train whatever you NEED first, and NOT the full learning skilltree.
For your first two-three weeks, getting a bunch of profession-related skills up to speed is a lot more important.
It will seriously hamper your progress in the long run if you fail to "make ISK" and focus on "getting the learnings done".

ONLY train the learning skills first if you already have a "main" account and this one is your secondary.
In this case, getting (via funding from main) a set of +3 implants and all L4 basic/L3 advanced learnings is mandatory as soon as possible.
After that, it's really your choice, but that's already a lot of attribute points within less than two weeks (normally).

6. Final words of wisdom ?

In this forum, you also have a pretty good outlook on how the starting skills get distributed between the races and schools.
Starter skillpack comparation thread
Only the RACE and the "profession" matters.
Bloodline and ancestry don't influence the starter skillpack, only the attributes you use to furter train/refine your choices.

You might want to get EVE-Mon downloaded, installed and configured once you created your character.
Just make sure you download it from THEIR site and not any 3rd party mirror, as you really don't want to end up with any keyloggers or trojans.

As for the "is it safe to use EVE-Mon" question, it has been repeatedly answered on these forums, even by devs.
Their reply: "we use it ourselves a lot".
If you're really paranoid (and have a bit of a programming bone in you), you can download the source code, check it, and build it yourself.

Oh, and as they always say... whenever you don't know when you're coming back online, ALWAYS set a long skill training.
Better train bits and pieces of a not-so-urgent L5 skill than miss several minutes, hours or even days of training time.
As skill training progress is not lost, you'll thank me later when " battleship L5 training complete" finally comes into EVE-Mail a lot sooner as expected/planned.

7. A FEW (LATE) WORDS ABOUT EVE-HQ

What is and where to get EVE-HQ ?

Forum thread - explains what it is, what it can do, etc.
Their downloads page - if you think you already know what it is, just download it directly.

How to use EVE-HQ to get your optimal character build for a certain skillplan ?

First, make sure you have it downloaded, installed, working properly, etc.
I had no trouble doing any of that, but if you do, ask in their forum thread or something like that.
Open up the "Character Creation" plug-in (hopefully you got that too already).
Go under "Character Goal Seek" and fill in your desired skillplan (might take a while, make sure you got them all). It automatically fills in prerequisites, so if you know you don't want any of the prerequisites trained higher, don't bother.

The most IMPORTANT thing now is the "allow attribute variations" checkbox.
Leaving this box unchecked (default) means all characters get +1 in each custom skillpoint.
You still get the best choice (race/bloodline/job) without it selected, but you don't know what the optimal custom attributes would be.
However, it calculates a LOT faster... on very, VERY long skill plans, with this checkbox selected, you could be waiting for HOURS (yes, hours, not minutes) before a result comes in.
On short skillplans however, it's not a problem, you might get a result in seconds.

NOTE : the times you get under "Optimal Queue Time" are implantless times, for all characters.
Obviously, if you train cybernetics and plug in some implants, the times will go down... but overall, the order will remain the same between characters.

A very short example, say you want the fastest way to a Gallente mothership alt (just the bare minimum needed to board it, not actually fly it properly) : only add "Gallente Carrier III" to the list.
Since this is a relatively short plan (not extremely short, but short enough so I'm not afraid I'll have to wait for hours), I'll also "allow attribute variations"... and then click "SEEK GOAL".

After you click, get away from the machine and let the calculations run. A progress bar will slowly fill up (if you have am extremely long plan, it could be minutes before the first bar fill shows up, so be patient). In my case (the above example), the first bar showed up in a couple of seconds.
About 15 minutes later (yeah, I told you the "allow attribute variations" makes it take a much longer time... and I don't have an extremely fast machine either), I'm presented with the results list.
Clicking on the "opt queue time" header orders it by completion time : SCREENSHOT .
"Std queue time" would be the skillplan WITHOUT any aditional learnings. Of course, nobody in their right mind would use that, but who knows.

Doing the same thing without attribute variations yields results in about 40 seconds (yeah, seconds, not 15 minutes), and the results are not THAT different : SCREENSHOT .
Also, you can easily decide where the custom points should go to without having to resort to the long search, just by looking at the next few best options.

Resistance Is Not Useless

2008-10-05T13:15:00.003+01:00

One of the first things you must get your head around as a new player is what is called resistance. Resistance is a rating of your ship's ability to cope with damage against specific types of damage. Different parts of your ship are more easily able to cope with different types of damage, and different ships are equipped already to be able to cope against different damage.

There are 4 different types of damage you can be dealt by an enemy:

Kinetic: Just hammering into you at speed, like a bullet.
Thermal: Melting you, like a flamethrower.
Explosive: Blowing up on impact, like a missile.
Electromagnetic (EM): Other types of radiation, like microwave and gamma radiation, like an atomic blast.

Logically enough most types of weapon deal more than one type of damage at once, eg:

Hybrid weapons deal kinetic and thermal damage.
Projectile weapons can deal explosive and thermal damage.
Laser weapons deal EM and thermal damage.

... and specific weapons and charges will deal different balances of the two types. The exception to this is missiles, which are specifically designed to deal one type of damage, and one only, though that can be any of the four types. Missile ships do however usually have a bonus to kinetic damage (since they are being thrown at the enemy anyway) so NPC missile throwers pretty much universally use kinetic missiles.

This means most enemies are fairly predictable, e.g.

Guristas use Caldari ships, firing hybrid weapons and missiles, damage will be Kin/Therm.
Angels use Minmatar ships, firing projectile weapons, damage will be Exp/Therm.
Sanshas use Amarr ships, firing lasers, damage will be EM/Therm.
Serpentis use Gallente ships firing hybrid weapons, damage will be Therm/Kin.

All very fascinating, you may be thinking, but what does this have to do with me? Most ships have bonuses to one type of weapon, so you are stuck with the one type of damage. This can be gotten around but where it affects you most is in your ships ability to deal with that damage.

To take shields as an example: Typically shields have the weakest protection against EM radiation, because it interferes with the electronics projecting them. If you go to your fitting screens you will see that by default most shields have 0% resistance against EM radiation, which means that an EM weapon dealing 100 damage will reduce your hitpoints by 100. Equally you will see, however, that an explosive weapon hitting the shield only does 50% of its damage. This means that against explosive damage, your shields are effectively twice as effective! To get the same effect for EM we would have to double the size of our shields. Or would we?

Actually there are specific mods that will increase our resistance to damage much more easily than simply increasing the size of our shields:

Shield resistance amplifiers are passive modules (i.e. you don't have to turn them on, and they don't use any capacitor) that give a huge boost to resistance. They only cover one type of resistance each and have a large penalty for using a second of the same type. They also have very low fitting requirements. Best used on small ships like frigates and destroyers.

Shield Hardeners are active modules that typically give an equally large boost to resistance when switched on, and a slightly lesser one when inactive. They have much less of a penalty for using more than one and some will protect against all types of damage. Used on all larger ships where the capacitor cost is insignificant.

You can also boost the effectiveness of these modules, particularly the passive ones, using skills; look at the shield compensation skills in the market.

The calculation for the effectiveness of these resistance mods is quite complex but the easiest way to think of it is that these mods increase your resistance by the percentage shown in their info but only taking your remaining unprotected percentage into account. For instance a 50% EM resistance mod will increase resistance on EM to 50%. The same kind of mod for explosive however will only increase resistance to around 75%. It has increased resistance by 50% of the remaining 50%. A second (active) hardener will increase it to around 87%, and so on. You can easily see therefeore that resistance never gets up to 100%; the most you can hope for is around 92%. This would mean however that an enemy that previously hit for 100 would be hitting for 8, which is much less threatening. When combined with boosters that increase a fixed amount of shield this will drastically increase the amount of damage you can withstand. Shields also have a natural recharge which will help more the greater your resistance.

So much for shields. For armor tankers the procedure is much the same;

Resistance or Energised platings are the passive modules (resistance require fewer skills but are less effective). Armor tankers, unlike shield tankers, have adaptive modules that can protect against all damage types, to a greater or lesser extent, but still require no capacitor usage.

Armor hardeners are the active modules.

For armor the relevant skills are armor compensation.

Finally there is structure. Typically structure has zero resistance to all damage types meaning by the time you are into structure it dissapears in a flash. Experienced pilots keep a Damage Control as part of their setup: this will not only at least double your structure resistances and therefore your survival time should the worst happen but also give a small bonus to armor and shield resists, which is unaffected by the stacking penalty. Damage controls are an active mod, but the cost is insignificant.

Using resistances to increase your damage is MUCH more effective than merely increasing the size of your shields/armor. A 90% resistance ship has effectively 10x the hitpoints of a ship without. Try increasing your shield by a factor of 10 without the use of resistances. Increasing the size of your shields also encreases the size of your ship, making you easier to hit. For armor increasing the size of your armor plating will make your ship heavier, and slow it down, also making it easier to hit (and also making it painful to get anywhere).

Introduction to PVE: A guide for l4 support

2008-09-23T22:52:00.005+01:00

The PVE and helpmymission channels hold a mission day each Tuesday. For the benefit of newer players here is how to join in, if you are unfamiliar with running missions, particularly higher level ones.

This assumes you have already picked an agent, or more likely that someone else is getting the missions. If you do need to find yourself an agent you can find one using the guide here. If you are getting the missions you also need to work on your social skills: look them up in the Market to see which ones have an impact on your payouts and loyalty points (LP), and your standing with the agent. Also bear in mind that if you are missioning for LP the LP store of your chosen agent's corporation better have something you want.

Once you have a mission, you need to pick a ship. Eve ships come in all shapes and sizes and you might haver a number that you have set up for specific tasks. The PVE ship needs to be specialised in two things, and two things only; Tank (being able to withstand a lot of damage) and Gank (being able to cause a lot of damage)., in that order. It's no good using a cloaking ship, or an ewar ship, or a ship with a huge hold, or a ship with a massive range. PVE combat missions are, for the time being, very simple. Get in, withstand the damage long enough to kill everything, get out again. Anything else on your ship is a waste.

All the races have ships that are suitable for PVE combat but some are easier than others. It is interesting to compare the damage output from NPC ships as a relative guide to what works best, and on that basis the Typhoon wins out, but the Typhoon is hardly ever used for PVE. Why? Because it takes a lot of real life skill for the micromanagement of shields, capacitor and weapons systems to make it so, and a lot of ingame skills to make the uber fittings work.

The ships that are used most are used because the more ingame skills you acquire, the easier they become to fly. Don't be put off using your chosen race's ships because you have been told they are 'worse' than another though. These things are purely relative. However check the ship info to see what bonuses it gets. If you are looking at a ship with bonuses to both Tank and Gank and nothing else, that's your baby.

I don't want to go too much into ship setups here, as that is a massive subject that people argue about on the forums every day, but a note on resistances: One of the main differences between PVE and PVP is the predictability of the enemy. You can look up guides to missions here, and with practise you will know them backwards anyway. This means you can prepare hardeners in advance to boost the resistance of your shields to the specific damage type and level the enemy will be throwing at you.

You can use a shield or an armor tank for PVE but shields are usually considered easier to deal with, as they use up those mid slots and whichever you use make sure you leave some low slots open for damage increasing mods. You can also utilise a very high shield recharge rate and resistance on some ships, Drake for instance, to put together a 'passive' setup that means you don't have to touch your defense mods at all, and can concentrate on hitting things. Again, for more on passive setups try the forums. To Repeat: This does not mean that you cannot use an armor tank for PVE. A friend uses a Megathron, for instance, very effectively.

If you are just helping out on someone else's mission, then assuming the person leading the mission knows what they are doing they should be the tank so you should be able to set up purely for gank; however for the sake of careless accidents I would always fit some tank, even if you never use it. In this circumstance you only need enough tank to keep you alive the couple of minute or so that it takes you to warp out. A damage control 2 makes a very useful emergency tank. The leadership skills of the fleet commander may also help. Bear in mind that speed mods, like afterburners, also count as Tank (ie running away), and are useful just for speeding up the mission too.

Once you have your ship set up, then, it's time to set out on your mission. You will usually recieve an invitation to join a fleet, either as an orange link in channel or a pop-up box. A couple of things to be wary of here, from the not so friendly; firstly your commander in the fleet has the ability to warp you, if he is in the same system as you, and could warp you into a trap. Secondly it is just about possible, by manipulation of the war system, to make you susceptible to being blown up even in hisec. Make sure you trust the people in the fleet you are joining.

You will get two new windows pop up when you accept; the fleet window and the broadcast window. Once you are in the fleet you can safely minimise the fleet window. Put the broadcast window somewhere out of harms way for now. I usually have my overview top right, my stack of chat channels bottom left, just above the row of minimised windows, and where it doesn't encroach on the HUD buttons. You might want to close a few windows you aren't using, it will speed up your connection and be less distracting. I put the broadcast window, made as small as it will go, just on top of the chat window. I then pin all of the windows to make them semi transparent, and keep them from floating around too much. Finally to both reduce lag and make seeing what is going on easier I turn on the tactical overlay, click both mouse buttons together and pull back to see the wider arena. For support vessels, rather than the tank, dont pull back too far, it is useful to see who is shooting.

So the tank warps in first, makes sure thay have at least some of the aggro (that is, the damage coming from the enemy) and calls you in. You will have a number of NPC (non player-controlled) ships, signified by red crosses of different sizes. In the overview it will tell you what these crosses mean. Sort your overview by distance from you and right click on the first one, and target it (or ctrl-click). right click it and click 'look at'. If it is firing at something you are safe to fire at it without fear of reprisal, NPC ships never switch targets unless their original target dissapears. DON'T use drones unless you are told it is safe to do so, and if you do then right click on the top left of the drones window and set them to passive, so they won't go off causing aggro somewhere unexpected; if a drone gets aggro, and then dies, the NPC will look around for something else to shoot at, and it could be you. Stick with the fleet commander (orbit them closely or just right click on them and click approach at the start) unless they tell you it is safe to do otherwise, proximity to the NPC's may likewise trigger aggro.

A knowledgable fleet commander may pick targets for you to shoot at; these will be marked by commands to 'Target!' and cross hairs on the ship in question in the main window. Either can be right clicked for targetting purposes.

In most missions specific ships are the trigger for new spawns of enemies, and the fleet commander will tell you to avoid shooting them. Those ships aside, you should either start with small ships (frigates and cruisers) and work up, or if you are being assigned targets by the fleet commander you may collectivevly be shooting at the largest ships and working down.

Missions are usually done on a casual basis so most of this will be communicated, usually, in the fleet window, rather than using audio communication. This is both so it stays there, for reference, and also because not everyone in the fleet may have audio access.

Follow the text commands otherwise, heading through warp gates AFTER the tank until the mission is complete. If you are in a position to loot or salvage a mission (ie you have a suitable ship and the mission owner has said it was ok) bookmark each gate as you come to it.

After the mission has been turned in as completed to the agent these gates will dissapear, but the loot and salvage will not, so you can return to the bookmarks unmolested to pick through. You may wish to rename them as numbers as you save them if you have been doing a lot of missions; you have up to two hours to return to them and they dissapear in order (that is, the bookmarks will eventually drop you in empty space). Salvage and loot after a mission can effectively double the total value of a mission, so do not dismiss doing this unless you are very rich or very short of time.

Your share in the bounties (an even split, if you are in the same area where they were killed) will arrive approximately twenty minutes later, and your share in the mission reward will come immediately it is turned in if the fleet commander decides to do so. At this point run away cackling, and counting your isk.

Zero Punctuation

2008-09-04T12:44:00.002+01:00

RE: Zero Punctuation's Eve Review.

Despite not owning a console I watch the reviews by ZP each week (in much the same way as I watch Top Gear despite not having a car) and was suprised and delighted this week to find that he was reviewing my dear favourite Eve.

In the way of such things I should offer a riposte to the review as a hardcore fan:

Right at the outset ZP states he isn't going to have anything to do with corporations. Well, OK. That being, kind of, uh, the point of Eve, you may as well stop here. That's like stating you're going to review WOW but you don't want to have anything to do with any of that magic palaver.

Cue lots of jokes about overweight bespectacled smelly whiny nerds. Erm. I don't think I fall into any of those categories, but the only other person I know in the real world who plays Eve does, so it makes me wonder... Well, he isn't whiny, but I kind of am at times, so I guess we make a set.

Bored, bored, bored, eyestrain. As a summary of Eve it leaves out a lot, but I can accept it. I certainly find myself bored a lot, and were it not for the fact of the timebased training system I would probbaly have quit. However that means you hang in there waiting for some interesting expansion that is always just around the corner because then you will be so much more uber than the newbies who have just been pulled in, haha. Fortunately usually you end up making something interesting to do yourself, this being a sandbox, and you having the benefit of YOUR CORPORATION.

Then there is the 'I don't understand it so it's rubbish' argument. Er, no. I don't think I even need to point out the flaw in this one.

Zp next complains that battles are of the 'fight till you look like you're going to lose then try to run away' variety. Erm. Isn't that true of all battles? Not just in gaming, but in the real world too. That's rather like complaining that when you played this game you still needed oxygen.

The training system; yes, it isn't perfect. I would like something that increased with how much you played the game. Oh wait a minute, there is. The more you play the game the more you understand it, something that isn't necessary in WOW and the like because you understand them after about three hours. Plus you get money and better social standing with NPC's, which pays off in its own ways too.

'Missions are all just variations on go here and shoot things'. Well, yes. I'll give you that one. I would like to see more complexity in missions but as they are just one of the million things you can do and mainly aimed at casual players it doesn't really concern me too much.

Ultimately I think you missed the point of Eve, ZP, because you failed to understand what a corporation is. If you think that it means you get given a cubicle and are told to sort beans till we get back to you you are imposing wow-like grind onto the terminology of Eve and making two plus two equal 3.

I hate this particular piece of terminology, but there is an apt two-word summary for this review.

ZP: Epic Fail.

Escaping

2008-08-14T14:08:00.003+01:00

I haven't been playing Eve much recently, having been distracted by rl events and also slightly bored by what I'm currently doing ingame. As what I want to try will probably involve getting blown up a lot I'm waiting till my alt finishes his training (offline, his account has run out) before jumping back in. Consequently I've not logged in often and I notice, as the couple of other times I have done this, that the corp starts to dribble away members. A CEO can't take a break from Eve; it is assumed the corp is breaking down if you do, even if when you are online you don't take any taxes or tell anyone what to do. That's a shame, but appears to be human nature.

For the time being I have joined Eve-University, to get in some PVP practice and training (yes, we all have things to learn) and to have more people to help. PVE corporation is still very much alive but not actively recruiting, and my alt is still a director. PVE directorships are available if anyone else has more time to spare for the corp.

Escapism

2008-07-21T15:03:00.002+01:00

I just posted on the forums at escapist magazine with this post, in reply to a thread about Eve. Felt it was worth sharing here too;

Firstly, as has already been said Eve is very different from the other online games out there. As it is the only one I play (now) perhaps the easiest way to sum up the differences is to explain what drew me to it.

1) I am a serious science fiction writer and reader. I watch mainly SF TV, go to see mainly SF movies and read mainly SF fiction. I like the sprawling, complicated backstory and political scope of SF. Eve has this in abundance, and as a player you can influence things on a galaxy-wide scale.

2) I don't like games like Quake and Half-life online (though I do play HL single player for the plot). I don't own a console. I don't have the fastest reaction times in the universe and twitch games just irritate the crap out of me.

3) I do like RTS games that require some prethought before setting out. The games I've played most other than Eve were probably Sim City and the Sims, though they eventually both frustrated in that they were basically grind without an ultimate goal.

4) I am not the kind of person who dives headlong into the game. I've read posts on here about never reading the instructions. I always read the instructions, and often search around for additional information as well. I am prepared to put in time learning something new, and I enjoy doing so.

5) I am very sociable online. I send lots of emails, post on forums, run a blog (for Eve) and chat on irc when I'm not playing Eve. I also listen to internet radio and have in the past been a DJ myself (but not online, except in the sense that the station broadcast on the net too). I like chatting to people around the world with new opinions and knowledge.

6) I have quite a bit of free time at the moment, working only part-time, so I can afford to dedicate quite a bit of time to a game.

7) I have management experience, and know how to delegate, to lead, and be diplomatic when necessary.

8) I have decent math and computer understanding. I've also worked in internet support.

9) I like giving advice, and will spend time helping people for no other reward than their success, but I'm also prepared to accept advice from new and old.

10) I try not to offend or harm people in my day to day life but I'm also prepared to accept that sometimes people will offend me and it isn't the end of the world.

Read those points and think about yourself in comparison. If you consider yourself the opposite to the majority of them then yes; you will hate Eve-Online. And that doesn't necessarily mean you are an idiot, it just it isn't the game for you.

Noob or Vet?

2008-06-27T20:29:00.004+01:00

The words veteran and noob get bandied about a lot in Eve. I would counsel you to use the latter as little as possible, as to anyone past their first month or so it is the worst insult there is. No-one likes to think of themself as a noob. However the question must be asked; what makes a veteran? When do you have the right to start dispelling advice?

Well the first thing that should be said is that Eve is huge. Never mind the size of the galaxy, the amount of detail in the mechanics of it and their interaction is simply staggering. Whilst there are some established 'best ways' to do things it is always possible to think outside the box and come up with some viable and effective way to do whatever it is you want. Be careful of reinventing the wheel, though.

The thing to beware of most is anyone who thinks they have it all sewn up. You can see them all over; people who think their way is the only way. Ask their advice but never take it as gospel (and that includes this blog). There are so many reasons to argue for veteran status; character age, time spent online, time spent in combat, time spent in PVP, ISK earnt, out of game research done, skillpoints attained... The list goes on and on. Equally each of those has an argument against it. Someone could start a character now and only log in to change skills once a week for five years; Are they a veteran? Skillpoints grow harder and harder to attain; level 5 in any skill takes longer than levels 1-4 combined for around a quarter of the advantage. We could argue forever about which is more important.

Ultimately if you have an answer to give someone, then don't be afraid to offer it, whether you have been in the game five minutes or five years. But the second you think you know it all...

Then there is a word for what you are. And it isn't veteran.

So you want to be a CEO?

2008-06-13T18:04:00.003+01:00

1) Get some experience of being in a player corp before starting one, to see what works and what doesn't. There is nothing that puts people off joining a corp faster than seeing corps of one with a 2 day old CEO who has only just left the training academy and barely had time to get through the tutorials.

2) There are 2 valid reasons for starting a corp:

Providing something that no-one else does.
Providing a home for an already established group of friends.

If you don't meet those criteria it will be assumed you just want to boss people around.

3) Don't recruit for a new player corporation in a system with a level 4 agent, you are unlikely to get many takers.

4) Recruiting in local anyway is generally considered in much the way as a telephone sales call. If you must do it keep it brief and have some connection to what happens in that system.

5) New corps that are not in a militia or an alliance are unlikely to attract much interest at all at the moment. Consider joining one to expend your playerbase.

6) You'd better be around a LOT, at least in the early days. Until you have reliable directors you are the first and only figurehead for the corp. If you're never online it's a pointless endevour.

7) You also need to know what you're talking about at least within your corp's specialist field, or younger players than yourself will soon drift away.

8) Recruiting for a small corp is the hardest job in the world. When people join a corp they usually do so to have people to talk to, as well as to share resources, The fewer people there are in a corp, the less likely it is there will be someone else there when you log on. Have at least a couple of core players in the corp to start with that you can rely on, or be prepared to be happy being in a corp of one.

9) If you're taking tax from people you'd better have something to give back in return.

10) Corporations full of new players are prime meat for pirate corporations. It costs a tiny amount to declare war upon you so that your corporation can be shot and even podded anywhere. Yes, even in HiSec space.

PVE and PVP

2008-06-11T09:58:00.004+01:00

Given the release of Empyrean Age and factional warfare missions I feel it is time to introduce the concept of PVP to the PVE player. The worlds of PVE and PVP combat are very different, and it is understandable that specialists in each skillset have very little understanding of the other until quite late in their gameplay experience. This is for a number of different reasons but primarily because PVP is a fleet activity and PVE is a solo one.

That is not to say that neither can be done the other way; the main contact a PVE player will have with PVPers is pirates can flipping or baiting, which is usually a solo activity, at least until the pirate hooks a PVE fish. Pirates can also often be found solo in low sec preying upon new players who wander in acidentally and do not yet understand the game mechanics, or other pirates in lesser ships.

However the bulk of PVP is conducted in fleets with a very different mindset. The differences are:

1) Income.

PVE missions and belt ratting provide a steady income in usually quite small increments. PVP fleet warfare often means long periods with no, or even negative, income punctuated by occasional massive payoffs. Usually those payoffs are from PVE goals (officer spawns in lowsec complexes that require running the gauntlet of other PVP fleets, for instance) or from killing those foolish enough to fly in lowsec with hideously rare modules.

2) Ship Loss.

A PVE player will only lose a ship if they make a mistake, on average once every few months or so. A PVP player has to leave station with the mindset that they will lose the ship more often than not. This is where the necessity for fleet warfare comes in. In PVE you can safely fly an expensive ship because you know exactly what you will be facing. PVP is almost always an unknown quantity where anything could happen. It is better to have three ships that combined have the damage of one when the cost of the single ships is three million each and the single ship is 70 million.

3) Skills.

This is the one that the PVE player gets hung up on the most. I have spoken to a lot of players who have said to me that they are waiting till they get better at the game before attempting PVP. I have to admit I have been guilty of this in the past myself. However it is important to realise this: PVP DOES NOT REQUIRE MORE SKILLS THAN PVE.

Keep repeating that to yourself until you understand it. Different, maybe. More, no. Any holes in the quantity of SP you have can usually be made up simply by having a larger fleet.

There are some skills useful in PVP that are largely useless in PVE for some members of the fleet:

MWD instead of Afterburner
Warp Scrambling
Recon Probing skillset
Electronic warfare skillsets (sensor dampening, sensor jamming, webbing, etc.)
Cloaking
Remote projection skillsets (transferring shields/armor/cap to other members of your fleet)
Cap draining skills (though these are less useful than they used to be)

Also in General guns work better than missiles, which is not to say that missiles are useless.

Just as in PVE of course more skills are better than fewer but don't think you need many millions of SP before you can join in. There will always be someone bigger and better than you but that shouldn't put you off having a go. A brand new character with the right skillsets can fly an electronic warfare specialist ship with remote projection and ew modules all ready to use, and has the advantage of it costing nothing to replace a clone should you get podded.

4) Patience.

Until now PVP was fairly random and involved a lot of waiting around and taunting before it would begin, whilst PVE had missions which could be logged into anytime you felt like shooting at something.

Now with the advent of Factional Warfare there are specific goals that can be completed anytime you wish, even if there is no other PVP player around. Like a PVE player you can log in anytime, get a mission, and set out to complete it. There will be some NPC players to fight, as in PVE, but there may or may not also be PVP players there to try and stop you too. Missions will change each time and not be set and knowable in advance. They will probably have a fleet, but there may be one or two or even no other PVP ships there at all.

This is Factional warfare. This is the Empyrean Age. This is now. Get in your ships and take part.

Corp Changes

2008-06-01T13:45:00.003+01:00

For those of you outside the corp:

There have been a number of changes to the corp setup recently. The most significant change is that the corp has split in two, allowing us to set up a hisec laboratory facility and give access to jumpclones to our members. I have also set up a corp outside of the alliance to allow us to join in with factional warfare when the war starts on June 10th. That should be fully operational and open to all alliance members and their alts as of 2nd June, with a current maximum of 200 members.

Also today the blog total number of unique visitors (since I installed the counters just over a month ago) hit 1000. I'd like to thank you all for stopping by and do come see us in our corp chat PVE or our alliance channel SAFE-PUB if you are interested in joining us.

New Sig Image

2008-05-27T14:07:00.002+01:00

Feel free to customise:

A Beginner's Guide To Making ISK

2008-05-20T11:49:00.005+01:00

- By Akita T.

There are several good ways to make ISK, and there are a lot of bad ways to make ISK. Not "bad" in the sense that you don't make any, but that you could easily do something else to get more.

Don't get me wrong, IF YOU WANT (and you find it enjoyable), DO ANYTHING. But in my experience, logic dictates you do "work" to achieve a purpose, and that purpose is to get ISK. What you do with that ISK afterwards, that's the most fun part, usually. If you find your particular way of making ISK more enjoyable than anything else you can do with the ISK you get, then go right ahead, keep doing it even if it's not the best way to make ISK.

For instance, you could mine in a cruiser/battleship, but you would be making more ISK in a barge or an exhumer. You could be mining various ore to reprocess and manufacture something and sell it for (at least) slightly more than the minerals, but you'd make more if you mined only the most valuable ore of the moment, sold all excess minerals and bought the rest from the market. If you go into manufacturing, you might as well just buy all minerals from the market, never actually mine a single piece of ore in your entire EVE life. You could be running courier missions in a battleship too, but an industrial is usually better, and the battleship is more suitable for kill missions. And so on and so forth.
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MAIN WAYS TO MAKE ISK

1. MINING

This is a very straightforward way. You go out in an asteroid belt, you start your mining lasers, you launch your mining drones (if you have any), and you haul the ore you mine in a station to be used later.It's a boring activity. VERY boring. But then again, this appeals to some, since it leaves you with time to do something else at the same time, like, chat. Or run several accounts at the same time. Or god knows what else.

The OPTIMAL progression is your racial mining frigate first (because it's easy to train for), then head straight to the SECOND of the mining barges (Retreiver), then to a Hulk directly.
DO NOT bother with destroyers, the mining frigate is better and faster, A mining cruiser is almost on par with the second barge, but going for the cruiser means a dead end, unless you go for a battleship, but then again you could reach the Covetor before you reach a decent level of mining in a battleship, and a Covetor is far superior... However, the Hulk is a tiny step away, skill-wise from the Covetor, and mines even better still, so you should probably just train for it as soon as you can use a Covetor, and skip the Covetor entirely.

Whenever you mine, LOOK at what ore is available in the region, and LOOK at existing mineral buy orders, then at existing mineral sell orders. Training the specific ore reprocessing skills should be one of the first things to do even if you don't plan on using T2 strip miners, since you can usually sell the minerals better than you could sell the ore. Whenever you decide WHAT to mine... always pick the thing that gives you MOST ISK PER CUBIC METER OF ORE MINED, if you refine and sell the minerals. The only reasonable exception would be if there's a high buy order for a specific type of ore : this can happen in systems where storyline agents offer the "Materials for War preparations" storyline mission (L3 version asks for basic Omber, L4 version asks for basic Kernite). Bottom line... see what you can get for your ore, both refined and unrefined, and pick the MOST VALUABLE one. Ignore the others.

There's not much more to be said about mining as a concept, everything else is details.The details are most clearly explained in here if you care to know them.
Final word of warning : ideal starting character is either a Prospector (any race, for the repro skills) or a Minmatar Engineer (Industry 5, Science 4).

2. SALVAGING (addition by TV)

Many people treat salvaging as part of mission running; run a mission, then loot and salvage your wrecks. However salvaging is very much a profession in itself. You can run around salvaging wrecks in belts and so on wherever you may find them with no penalty for doing so, other than occasionally the indignation of the person who created the wreck. One piece of salvage can be worth up to half a million ISK in itself, so when you are first starting out this can be very lucrative indeed, making you many times the usual reward from the mission.

If you combine salvaging with a few exploration skills you can also pop up in someone else's mission and start cleaning up their wrecks too, when you don't have the ability to kill those rats yourself. Mission runners often get very hurt by this so ask first if you are concerned about keeping friends. Also if they are bothered by it they might leave the mission for a while leaving you to face the NPC on your own. Alternatively you can find some friends who don't salvage (level 4 mission runners often can't be bothered with 'minor' missions) and clean missions with their consent. A word of warning either way; salvaging is fine but the second you open a wreck and remove loot you become criminally flagged and can be shot by the owner. Don't do it!

3. MISSION RUNNING

Right now, there are four main types of missions you can be offered : courier, trade, kill and mining. Mining missions are a relatively recent addition (or return, some might argue).
Agents give you various types of missions, depending on their division (it's in their showinfo).Most agents' divisions are pretty obvious... for instance, Command and Security agents give you mostly kill missions, Storage agents give you mostly courier missions, and so on and so forth. While there are plenty of listings of "types of missions for agent division" floating around, none of them are quite accurate, as they also depend on several other factors AND also a lot of randomness (for instance, while unusual, a Command agent might offer you 10 courier missions in a row). So, in most cases, just go with your gut... worst thing that could happen is you reject a mission.

If you accept a mission however, the wisest course of action is to complete it succesfully, there are penalties (in standings) for failing a mission. So, ALWAYS check the mission info BEFORE you accept it. Check the mission type, and check the route you have to take to complete it.You might want to reject kill missions if you only have an industrial ship, and you might want to reject a courier that has you going into or through a lowsec system... or, you might want to reject a mining mission if you have lousy mining skills.

Of course, you can always risk it and take all missions, but in the early stages, while you learn the ropes, it's best to avoid missions you're not suited for. The "time bonus" on each mission is optional. Mission expiration date is the important thing (one week from the moment you took the mission, or the first mission in the chain, in case of chained missions). FAILING to complete a mission in one week or telling the agent you are unable to finish it will bring a standings penalty.

There are some special missions we like to call (or at least I like to call) "chained missions". You will recognize them by their name. For instance : "Enemies Abound : 1 of 5" (or "Enemies Abound 1/5").They are usually a set of missions of several types, and to get to the last one (usually the best paying one) you have to complete each of the previous ones first. Failing or rejecting one of them means you're not offered the rest.

There are drawbacks to REJECTING a mission too. If you reject a mission, a 4 hour timer for that agent starts (hidden to you, so you might want to write down the moment you clicked the reject option for the agent). IF you reject ANOTHER mission before the timer expired, you will take a standings hit with the agent, his corp AND HIS FACTION. While the standings hit is not huge, it's a good idea to avoid it nevertheless. That's why areas with multiple agents for the same corp or faction are prefered by mission-runners, since you can just ask another agent for a mission while the timer expires on another mission you were offered and you want to reject.

3.1. MINING MISSIONS

The missions are pretty straightforward. You have to go to some location and mine out some "special" ore (one that can't be reprocessed, AFAIK) from some asteroids, and bring the ore back to your agent. It's a good idea to have decent mining skills for this type of mission, obviously.
Whilst the mission description usually tells you to bring the agent a certain quantity of ore, you might find that you need to mine the ENTIRE mission area completely before the mission can be completed.While annoying, it's a good thing too, since ore lost "accidentally" by not having enough cargo (auto-jetissoned in space without a can) is LOST. It's better to have the mission take a while longer instead of watching helplessly while you have no other choice except failing it.

3.2. COURIER MISSIONS

These are the easiest missions you could possibly ask for : pick up stuff in station A, deliver it in station B. They are also a bit boring, but unlike mining, they make you move around a lot, yet you do not have to constantly check the market to see what's best to mine at the moment.
You can usually complete them in any ship with a large enough cargo.Most of them don't even have to be completed in a single trip, since they're made out of several identical packages... the mission description tells you how many packages they are and the total volume (so you can easily calculate how large one single package is - that's the minimum cargohold space you NEED to finish the mission).If you have a small ship and a large cargo, you might have to forefit the bonus reward as you are forced to take several trips... but you still get the regular reward, and all the standing increases, so it's not tragic.

Things to watch out for? Destination or routes going through lowsec (try to avoid them, check route before accepting mission) or packages to large to fit in your cargo (the warning comes for the TOTAL cargo, not one package, so you have to check manually, like I said).

3.3. TRADE MISSIONS

This mission is basically "half a courier mission".You don't have to pick some package up and deliver it somewhere else... you just have to deliver something to the destination.HOW you get the goods is not any of your agent's concern. You will usually buy them from the market, either where you find it cheapest or closest to the destination.

Things to watch out for : even if in most cases the agent will offer you a lot more ISK or an object much more valuable as a reward, in some rare cases, the cargo he asks for is valuable yet the reward nearly worthless. So you have to check how expensive the desired mechandise is, and how much the reward is worth.

3.4. KILL MISSIONS

Well, what's there to be said ?Go in, kill stuff, optionally you might be asked to collect some item from one of the killed ships or structures and return it to the agent.Sounds simple, but it's also the most dangerous mission type around.At the same time, it's also the most lucrative type too, offering the greatest rewards both directly (ISK and Loyalty Points), but also indirectly, in form of bounties, loot, salvage, ocasionally tags or alloys instead of bounties... all from the wrecks of the destroyed enemies.

While the direct rewards (ISK and LP) might vary according to agent division, skills, standings and system security rating, all of the indirect rewards are almost identical (except for the normal randomness) for a certain mission. Also, the secondary/indirect rewards are usually much higher than the direct rewards, and because of that, highsec "kill mission" running is the favourite ISK-making activity of a lot of pod pilots. Another reason is that it only requires skills you could also use in PVP combat, so it's even more of an incentive.

Even if pilots were able to complete some L4 missions solo in ships as small as assault frigates, they were experts, and it still took a long time. You usually want to fly a frigate only in L1s, a cruiser in L2s, a battlecruiser in L3s and battleships in L4s. It's not a strict rule, but more of a general guideline, and feel free to either experiment or ask around about alternatives.
It's also a good idea to try and run missions together with other people you trust.

3.5. STORYLINE MISSIONS

These are special types of missions you are offered after completing 16 missions of a certain level for agents of a faction. The agents do not matter, only their faction and the agent level. The storyline agent "triggered" will belong to the same faction and offer you a storyline of that particular level.

Storyline missions are THE ONLY REPEATABLE WAY TO GAIN FACTION STANDINGS.The only other ways are non-repeatable (rookie missions and COSMOS missions - once you complete them you never get them offered again on the same pilot).
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4. SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY

To put it bluntly, if you are a beginner to EVE, it is best if you stay away from this area.The only notable exception to this rule is manufacturing.

Yes, I may sound very harsh, but science and industry is best attempted with large ISK starting funds, and small-scale efforts are bound to either never really get off the ground or fail miserably, while you caould have made a lot more progress soing something else instead. Once you get more cash in your wallet and you gain experience in the game, feel free to revisit the idea of science and industry... but then again, you won't be a beginner, so this guide does not apply to you.

4.1. MANUFACTURING

Like I said, the only exception is manufacture. And by that, I mean T1 manufacture, and preferably in either ammo, modules, rigs or small ships (because of the relatively affordable blueprint costs).Do not even bother with manufacture before you have Production Efficiency trained up to level 4, and try to get it to level 5 as soon as possible.

For more details on what to manufacture, how and where, visit the Science and Industry subforum, and check the science and industry guides here. A good idea would be, for instance, to manufacture ammo in mission hubs, or frigates, cruisers and assorted modules (for the frigates/cruisers you also manufacture) somewhere near a lowsec (or even 0.0) system on a major transit "pipe" across EVE.

Things to watch out for : OPPORTUNITY COST.That means, if you are selling something, you'd better damn well sell it for more ISK than you could have made by simply selling the things you used to manufacture it with... or else there's no point in manufacturing at all in the first place.
That's the most critical mistake a rookie manufacturer makes : selling below cost. And the reason he does not go bankrupt is that he usually mines the ore himself, then reprocesses it, and uses those minerals to manufacture. SURE, if you CANNOT sell the minerals at an acceptable price in the location they are in, then manufacturing something that actually sells at that location would make sense (but only if the effort is less than the effort you'd have to make to haul the minerals somewhere they can sell). But if you CAN sell the minerals decently, manufacturing and selling something below that "opportunity cost" is STUPID.
_______

5. HAULING

There's two main types here : the hauler/trader, and the pure hauler. The differences between them are minor enough not to justify treating them separately.

Basically, "hauling" is almost the same as NPC courier and/or trade missions. Courier contracts are almost the same as NPC courier missions, but the difference is, you have to move it all in one go.Hauling stuff is basically the same as a trade mission, but you set your own destination and cargo type : you just scour the market for cheap things in one station that sell high in another one, and move them around.

6. TRADING

Some people like to include "non-courier contract hauling" in this category. I personally like to simply call it hauling (or, at the extreme, "hauling/trading") instead of trading.It doesn't really matter what we call it anyway Truth is, a "true" trader doesn't even have to leave the station he's located in... he can, of course, but he doesn't need to, as he can set up courier contracts so others haul for him (for a price, or course).

Trading can be explained in many different ways, you can go into details of what to sell and what to buy, when to do it, how to manipulate a market to see a spike in price and so on and so forth, and you can read a lot of such stories over in the Market Discussions subforum.

The thing is, eventually, it all comes down to a single thing : buy low, sell high. Whether you buy low in place A and sell high in place B, or you sell and buy in the same station at a small price difference, or even if you buy and buy a lot witing for price to grow then sell it all at the higher prices... it's all just details.

Things to watch out for : prices you sell/buy at, and all broker fees or sales taxes. It's a BAD idea to disable the market-related warnings : people have accidentally put up an order with an extra zero (or two, or three), and not only did the taxes amount to more than they would have wanted to buy/sell the items for originally, but they also lost the ISK or the goods in question more often than not. A SINGLE mistake in trading might very well cost you a FORTUNE, so, well... Don't make any mistakes.
_________________

7. COSMOS COMPLEXES

This is a lot like mission-running, after a fashion.The big difference however is that you can only do it in the "COSMOS" constellations, and NPCs respawn continually in there. A list of empire-based COSMOS areas can be found by a simple site google search, but here's one of the possible results : Eveinfo - Caldari COSMOS page.

EVEinfo is also a decent resource for regular missions too, in case you want to have an idea of what to expect in them.
______

8. RATTING

This is a lot like mission-running too, but it's done in asteroid belts.The problem is that the "good NPC rats" only appear in lower-security systems, and the very good ones only in deep 0.0 space.
The advantage of ratting (especially for the beginner) is that highsec belt rats are VERY EASY to kill, and you find usually a lot less of them compared to what you could find in a mission. The drawback (compared to a mission) is that you don't get any agent/corp/faction standings for doing this (but you still might lose a bit of standing with the pirate NPC factions - you would lose them if you ran missions too, anyway).

The other (minor) advantage of ratting is that there's always a (very small) chance of encountering a "faction spawn", even in empire highsec.While they usually only drop some tags, faction ammo and such, you might also find occasionally some valuable faction modules, or even more valuable implants. Still, it's a small chance, and the drops are very random, so it's not a good source of steady income.
___

9. EXPLORATION

A mix between missions and ratting, you will either use the shipboard scanner or scanner probes to seek out cosmic signatures signalling an encounter or an exploration site. The shipboard scanner is only able to find "encounters", and they are almost the same as a mission... but you have a slightly higher chance (compared to belt-ratting) to encounter faction or even commander NPC spawns dropping valuable loot.Using probes you can find various other things, but these are best left for others to explain.
Highly random, it might not be a good idea for a beginner either... but maybe fun for a while ?

10. MERCENARY WORK / WARS

While not the best avenue for a solo beginner pilot, it could be a nice endeavour for a group of younger pilots, especially if they can find a tutor of sorts in the "art of war"... but, like they say, experience is the best teacher. Basically, you find somebody in need of protection... or in need of a good shakedown... and you start a corporation war against your chosen targets. It could be good, it could be bad, but as long as your goal is to have fun, every bit of ISK you get from it is an added bonus... if you pick your targets carefully, you might actually make some decent money, even if your group is not that good. Of course, the opposite could happen, and you end up all losing everything you have.

Definetely not the best thing for a beginner to do, but it's still something you can do.

11. VARIOUS "DUBIOUS MORALITY" ACTS

Among them, included but not strictly limited to them, things like baiting, can-flipping, ganking, suicide ganking, pirating, ransoming, scamming, ninja-salvaging and so on and so forth. Scamming in itself could fill whole threads, for instance... from contract scams, to chat spams, the "lofty scam" and so on and so forth, the possibilities are almost only limited by your imagination (and your victim's stupidity, greed, lack of knowledge or a combination thereof).
While not the most lucrative things you can do on a regular basis, SOME of them can offer the enterprising (and unscrupulous) beginner untold riches compared to any other endeavour he could embark on, at his "young age".

To get an idea of the thinks I've mentioned, you can head over to the "Crime and Punishment" subforum and read about other people's stories regarding this "illicit" lifestyle.
________________

Final words ?

While I'm sure I have missed a lot of things that a beginner COULD do, and I might have mentioned a few that a beginner normally shouldn't even try to do, overall, I hope you (the reader, assumed to be a beginner) got a pretty decent idea of how to make (and for that matter, not lose) ISK in this game to the best of your abilities.

Farewell Rookie Help

2008-05-08T12:05:00.003+01:00

Since my application for ISD went down like a lead balloon, my alt is about to time out of it, and I've been told off by a volunteer for posting links in there anyway (though why I can't is a secret, apparently) it is time for me to wave goodbye to the help channels.

If you found this site through rookie help and want to get further help you can find me in the channel PVE to post your questions which I will continue to answer here, or find another mentor in the channel 'adoptions' which you will find under help in the channels list. Although the channel PVE is a corp public channel we are happy to accomodate friends in there too.

I also recommend Grismar's Eve wiki (over the official one, as it works ingame) at:
eve.grismar.net

Update: I've now been told what my telling off was for. I'm a little confused as to what it means, and whether I can tell you what it means as it would mean quoting a GM.

Well I'll risk it. The gist was that my link was to a 'self-promoting' website (as this is a site I make no money from, without ads, I don't really see how that is relevant. If I took off any personal info would that be better?) and answered questions that could be answered in a single sentence. If anyone feels that any of the posts in here would work as a single sentence please mail me. I'm all for brevity.

Anyhoo I will try and resist posting in there again for the next few hours, painful though it is watching rookies flounder.

Notes From An Alt: Size

2008-05-08T01:24:00.002+01:00

Click to enlarge

Notes From An Alt: WoW vs Eve

2008-05-08T00:07:00.004+01:00

Click to enlarge

Notes From An Alt: Rookie Help

2008-05-07T23:31:00.002+01:00

Click to enlarge

Can Not

2008-05-07T22:37:00.005+01:00

Click to enlarge
- http://hydra.stripgenerator.com/

Noob Help Questions

2008-05-02T00:52:00.003+01:00

I've been hanging out in rookie help a lot recently and I'm constantly amazed at the constant rain of silly questions from people who don't seem to have taken ANY time to research the game for themselves. With apologies everyone who sees their question here, I'm sure you thought they were reasonable at the time but let these questions serve as a warning. THINK before you type, find a mentor to answer your questions (probably in a player corp with you, PVE, for instance) and if you need a lot of help for heaven's sake do the tutorials!

q > how i earn better ship an more isk

q > I might have just piloted myself into a star, what should I do?

q > my ship is out of control what do i do

q > how do I shot web?
a > press shot web button

q > i'll give it a go now. how do you keep up with someone once they gone to warp?

q > what use could i have for a frozen corpse?

q > unfiting the modules, how?

q > buy when i press buy it says some frking shit

q > Does this game have any PvP content?

q > whats the name of a station in this game?

q > does researching allow me to build it without a blueprint...?

q > does anyone know which LP store i should go to to get a navy megathron?

q > where else do i get missions besides kisogo?

q > hi everyone, im just spawned in game and a red cross tagged automated centii training vessel start to attack at me, what should i do?

q > how do i work

q > Can you sell ships?

q > what does pinning a window do?

q > After you buy an item do you have to go to that station to pick it up?

q > what are the things that expand ur cargo space

q > Is that possible to reload my turrets in space?

Real Money Trading Is Bad, M'Kay?

2008-04-30T18:19:00.001+01:00

- copied from the devblog by GM Grimma to provide an ingame link:

Real Money Trade (RMT) in EVE has been a problem for a long time now. Those of us who have been in the Customer Support business since the beginning of EVE could tell you a lot of horror stories about the damages ISK selling and buying has resulted in to date, and still does. Almost all cases of keyloggers, phishing sites, hacking attempts, and the like, are directly attributable to real money trading.
There are also the macro miners and mission runners, complex farmers and assorted rabble of this sort that causes general nuisance and keeps the regular players from being able to enjoy EVE as they would like. Price of minerals, ore, ice, implants and so on is driven down by this kind of activity and thus ways for normal players to make ISK are effectively ruined. Finally, the RMT element will not hesitate to commit real world crimes, such as credit card fraud or theft, to keep their business running.

Purchasing ISK directly supports and encourages these illegal activities!

While we are determined to root out the evil that are the ISK sellers in EVE, we do realize that there will always be demand for ISK. For those that need more ISK than they can gather via normal game play, there is another way. We are of course talking about the Secure ETC Trading System, designed and created by CCP's finest. Now, every time we start denouncing the ISK sellers, some people call us hypocrites because we allow the ISK for ETCs but not ISK for RL money and claim this is the same thing. Nothing could be farther from the truth; the differences are enormous.

When you buy an ETC and then sell it for ISK via the Secure ETC Trading System you are directly contributing to the growth of EVE as the code will be applied to an account and someone will be using it to play. Some players do not have the means to pay for their subscriptions with credit cards or similar and the Secure ETC Trading System helps them pay and play. The economics are quite different as well since wealth is redistributed between active members of the community rather than injected into the game.

Another thing is scale. The regular player who wants a few hundred millions in his wallet will have no problem using the Secure ETC Trading System for this purpose, while at the same time helping another EVE player pay for his subscription. Supply and demand dictates that it would be very difficult for an individual to gather tens of billions of ISK with the secure system and thus game balance will not be upset. Corporations, or even Alliances, should not be able to fuel their wars and other activities like they have done in a number of cases with ISK bought for real world money.

For a list of official ETC resellers, please go here:

https://secure.eve-online.com/etc.aspx

Although somewhat hampered by limited resources, we are doing our best to keep RMT in EVE at bay, such as the recent deployment of new features to curtail the real money trade spam that players were receiving. This new system includes a few new trial restrictions that should not significantly affect actual players, as well as a large number of behind the scenes features that we have added in. These so far have been very successful, and we have seen a very dramatic reduction in the amount of spam that is reaching players.

However, we need your help. If you need ISK, then please use the Secure ETC Trading System. This system is completely secure and risk free and the ISK you get this way is yours to keep, while we will mercilessly remove ISK bought for real money from ISK sellers, and we remove tens of billions of illegally purchased ISK every day. If the illegally bought ISK has been spent, then the wallets will simply be put in the negative, making any form of market activity impossible, as well as preventing any actions that require ISK to be spent such as new clones or buying ship insurance.

A permanent warning will also be placed on accounts involved. In extreme cases and for repeated offenses a permanent ban from our server will be the end result. Also note that trading ETCs outside the Secure ETC Trading System is a violation of our rules and will result in warnings for those doing it, and eventually bans should they persist.

We know that most players out there dislike the macroers, ISK spammers, complex farmers and other RMT spawn just like we do and we ask for your assistance in dealing with them. Tell your friends that buying ISK is against the EULA if the subject is raised. Tell them about the Secure ETC Trading System. Help us raise awareness about this whole issue and together we can change the world of EVE for the better!

Learning Curve

2008-04-30T17:29:00.001+01:00

- from an anonymous source.

The Oldest Professions

2008-04-29T23:36:00.004+01:00

No, not that one. The lowest, dirtiest, low down son's of... Ahem. Everyone has met them at some point. The scammers, the con artists, the swindlers, the cheats and the muggers. Yes, the criminal classes are here too, and here's what to look out for:

The Sneak Thieves
Please sir, may I join your corporation? May I have access to all your shiny things? May I bundle every last one of them into my friends' freighter and dissapear?
Weigh up how well you know people against what you could lose if you turned out to be wrong. People have wheedled their way into confidences and stolen everything from ammo to carriers. Restrict access to hangars to new members, or keep things in your personal hangar if you aren't sure about a director.

The Muggers
In Eve they would be the gate gankers. Usually found watching the gates into low security space occasionally they will hang around in high security space in cheap but powerful ships waiting to explode that faction fitted ship you worked so long to get (sacrificing theirs in the process). Remember 'don't fly what you can't afford to lose' applies in hi-sec too.

The Rollers
'Oh please, kind and strong looking person, won't you help me kill these nasty pie-wats for me. Yes, join my fleet. Here, I'll even warp us. Well, whaddya know, someone I happen to be at war with is here. Strange how he just ignored me and went for you. Still, I'm gonna take all your nice stuff, as you're dead anyway'.
Only join fleets with your alliance or people you know REALLY well, or alternatively YOU set up the fleet and retain control over who gets invited. If you are in control and the only other person is in an NPC corp you are safe enough to be helpful.

The Baiters
'Here, look, a can with interesting things left abandoned. I wonder what's in it? A little ore. Well, there's no-one around so I might as well take it. Wait, where did that ship come from? Why can't I warp? I wasn't really stealing, Concord, help! They said I could have it and everything!'
If it's yellow, it's not yours. They lie in wait cloaked and, when you take it and get flagged for thievery, invite their friends to swoop in to kill you. It doesn't matter how many 'free stuff' signs they pasted on it. Don't fall for it.

The Flippers
So there you are, merrily mining away into a can ready to get your hauler to come get it when you have enough when someone appears in a small ship, pops out a can of his own and puts all your precious ore into it. He is flagged as a thief but he's ina combat ship. But he's not firing. So what do you do. Oh the indignity. Well you take it back of course. Oh, except you are now flagged to him as well, and he can shoot you, or invite his friends to. Damn, here I am in a pod again. Who was it told me high sec space was safe, again?
If this happens to you and you're prepared to lose your ship you could invite your corp to give you backup before you take it back, get them to do it, or you could just chalk it up to experience and leave it there. For real security mine into a passworded, anchored can instead, or just into your cargo.

The Scammers
These come in several different varietes; the buy contract that is just a few zeroes too short, the in-station trader who substitutes a cheaper version at the last second, the sell contract that says it is for a Navy Raven but is actually just for a Raven. Remember the rule of the hustle: if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Tranquility and Singularity

2008-04-29T09:42:00.003+01:00

New players of Eve may be unaware there is more than one server that you can log into. The main server on Eve is called Tranquility, and is the one set up by default. The other server you might want to give a try is called Singularity, and is a test server for upcoming game features and patches. Singularity updates on a regular basis (about once a month) with all your details from the main server (if you are very new to the game you might not be on there yet, and if you are on there your skills will be a little behind Tranquility).

However, and this is the most important bit, Tranquility is unaffected by Singularity. You can buy as many expensive ships as you like on Singularity (and you can pick up ships from frigates to motherships for the grand price of 100 ISK) and it won't touch your Tranquility wallet, can be blown up a billion times without affecting your Tranquility SP, and can swear at agents without causing the same ones in Traquility even the slightest flicker of disapproval. Plus of course you get to try the new features before anyone else.

So how do you get in to this fabulous hidden playground? Well the most important thing is DO NOT LOG INTO SINGULARITY WITH YOUR MAIN EVE INSTALLATION. If you do it will be patched with the test patch (which may never become valid for Tranquility) and you will not be able to log into eve normally without a full re-install. Instead:

1) Navigate to your Eve folder (normally C:\Program Files\ccp\EVE).
2) Copy and paste it, so that within the folder ccp you have another folder called something like 'Copy Of Eve'. Be aware that this can be quite a large folder, up to 2GB, so make sure you have enough disk space, and that this might take a while to copy.
3) Rename this new folder to 'Singularity'.
4) Open up the folder and create a shortcut on your desktop to the file marked 'eve.exe'. Rename this to Singularity also.
5) Right-click on the shortcut and click properties. Under the shortcut tab go to the box marked 'Target'. After the last set of quotes add:
/end /LUA:OFF /server:87.237.38.50
6) Close the box and double click to start Singularity. Log in as normal and accept any patch requests, double checking that the file location is the new folder. Sometimes it will be unable to patch automatically, in which case you will need to look up the patch details from the website.

Note all the above assumes you are using a Windows PC.

Trial Restrictions

2008-04-27T12:47:00.002+01:00

There are several restrictions while you are on a trial. The reasons for all of them boil down to three letters. RMT: Real Money Transfer, i.e. those people that come into tha game for free and make ISK which they sell for real world money. For an indepth explanation of why that hurts the economy you can read the devblog here (out of game).

The restrictions are:

1) No ISK transferring while on a trial: So all those ISK farmers can't just pass on their ISK. This is mainly to prevent the laundering of ISK, rather than direct transfer to real players(after it has been through several hands it becomes progressively harder to track).

2) Some ships cannot be trained while on trial: To prevent the use of ships which could potentially make lot of money early on to an experienced player. The ships affected are ones which otherwise would be quick to train for.

3) You cannot launch two or more clients on the same computer if one of them is a trial: To prevent a player creating hundreds of alts to mine for him or creating a PVP fleet of alts.

4) You cannot join many chat channels while on trial: To prevent spamming of the chat channels by ISK spammers. If they are bugging you in corp chat try joining a player corp. In local you will just have to block them when they appear.

Rookie FAQ (3): Trading ISK/Items

2008-04-27T02:46:00.003+01:00

How do I trade ISK with another character?

Several options exist:

If neither character is on a trial account, one can right-click the other's icon (in People & Places or anywhere else) and select Send Money.

If neither character is on a trial account, either can setup an item exchange contract which includes isk.

Regardless of whether characters are on trial accounts, they can simultaneously dock in the same station and trade with each other (by right-clicking the other character in the Guests panel.

If two trial account characters cannot dock in the same station simultaneously (e.g. they are on the same account), they can exchange isk by trying to sell a common item at a ludicrously high price, and then have the other character buy it.

Finally if you are in the same player run corp you can exchange items via the corp hangar (click on corp hangar in the station it's at, usually the HQ, drag and drop items into it. Just buy items of a good value and trade them to let the other party sell them at little loss or, if you have picked well, at a profit. Ammo is usully a good place to start.

Rookie FAQ (2): Deadspace

2008-04-27T02:19:00.001+01:00

Check the mission details to see what system the deadspace complex is in. Travel to that system (if necessary) by using stargates and/or the autopilot. Once in the correct system, right-click in open space and at the bottom of the menu, below Agent Missions:, you will see a menu item for your mission. A submenu will include an option to warp to the complex gate.

Another method is to close and re-open the tutorial. If you are in the correct system, you will be prompted if you want to warp to the complex.

Finally, the following is from an in-game helpful bio:

If you're here, you probably need to get back to the Deadspace Tutorial Complex to continue the tutorial. Just follow the instructions below:

In order to get back, you must be in your home system. This is the first planetary system that you start in. When you are in the home system (read below if you aren't sure) then continue on.

When you are sure you're in the right system, view the left sidebar, the Neocom. Near the bottom, you will see a button that says Tutorials, with a picture of a white face. A new window should appear with a list of tutorials. Click on the first option, Aura : Tutorial. When the tutorial window appears, you will automatically be warped to the Deadspace Tutorial Complex. You should now be at the tutorial area.

Rookie FAQ (1): Ship Fitting

2008-04-27T02:06:00.007+01:00

With apologies to the wiki: Why do CCP always make pages that can't be read ingame?

How do I increase my ship's powergrid?

The best method is to study the engineering skill, which will increase the powergrid of every ship you fly by 5% per level. You can also fit a power diagnostic system or a reactor control unit, or for a frigate, a micro auxiliary power unit.

How do I increase my ship's CPU?

The best method is to study the electronics skill, which will increase the CPU of every ship you fly by 5% per level. You can also fit a co-processor.

How do I increase the cargohold capacity of my ship?

For certain ships, like industrials, simply increasing your piloting skill (e.g. Amarr Industrial) will increase your cargohold size. You can also install Expanded Cargohold modules in your lo-slots or, for richer players, Cargohold Optimization rigs. Finally, if you have over 3,000m3 of cargohold size, consider keeping a Giant Secure Container in your cargohold: they are 3,000m3 in size, but they will hold 3,900m3. This is a 30% increase when carrying small items, but don't do it if you want to carry items larger than 3,900m3.

What are upgrade hardpoints?

Upgrade hardpoints are used to fit rigs, which can be found in the market under the category 'Ship Modifications'.

How do I increase my drone hold size/launcher hardpoints/turret hardpoints/ship fitting slots?

You can't. Buy a better ship.

Hammer's Eve

2008-04-22T12:39:00.005+01:00

Cam across another blog today that is doing much the same thing as this. To save duplicating, here are some of the links on his site that are most useful:

Eve for experienced gamers
Missions, money and standings
PVP in Eve
0.0
Threat assessment
Ships, races and weapons
Career Choices

Note unfortunately these links don't work ingame, so I might end up doing a version of them anyway.

What me mine?

2008-04-17T13:53:00.002+01:00

Akita posted this on the forums and I echo her sentiments so absolutely I had to ask permission to reproduce it here (and for pvp read any other kind of non-mining eve activity):

I see a LOT of posts around here from relatively new people where they say something to the extent of "I really want to PvP, but I want to fund my PvP with mining ops income".
This is wrong on so many different levels that I just had to start a new thread just for this.

First off, the skillset for mining is hugely different from the skillset for combat.
Not only that, but it places emphasis on different attributes too.
IF you're trying to get "good at PvP", alongside practical, hands-on experience, you also need the in-game character skill levels to back that up.
If you're WASTING time (yes, wasting) on mining-related skills instead of combat-related skills, you will not be particularly good in either of them (hence, less money earned from mining to spend on PvP at which you'll suck, causing you to lose ships more often, and vicious circle repeats).

Second, even assuming for a second you thought of that too, and actually run TWO characters on separate accounts (one with high per/wil and decent int. for combat, the other with high mem/int and decent perc. for industry) , leaving aside the fact that it's borderline crazy to do that (instead, of, say, selling the GTC you would have used for the second account to get the funds)... there still is the problem of mining being so utterly soulcrushingly BORING and annoying at the same time that I have more fun spinning shuttles in my hangar instead. And no, don't rely on the fact you can do it half-AKF or somesuch... you risk coming back to "absolutely nothing", since you ship has been blown up by a stray NPC or a suicide ganksquad (depends on ship, really)... or worse, come back only to see that asteroid you've started mining only had a handfull of units left, and your ship has been basically sitting idle for a very long time.

Last but not least, taking into account what I've just said, why oh why don't you just do missions instead ?
Missions require almost the same skillset as PvP does : you generally don't EWar NPCs, and MWDs usually can't be activated in missions, but that's about it for the major differences.
Missions deliver (at least in HIGHSEC) at least the same, if not always better rewards than mining does, and as an added bonus, you're also gaining standings with the NPC corporations, providing you with discounted broker fees, reduced refinery taxes and at some point the ability to place jumpclones in those NPC stations.
Not only that, but good standings open up the road to R&D agents, which is basically "bonus ISK without much actual work" (a.k.a. "passive income")... just start the project, and come by to collect (and then sell) cores every now and then.

Ok, now don't get me wrong, mining CAN be profitable.
But it requires quite a bit of dedication, patience, and preferably access to some 0.0 ores deep into your own alliance's space, in a larger mining op with protection, haulers and ideally a Rorqual with a mindlinked commander.
For highsec or lowsec dwellers however, missions are a much better way to earn a living (and safer too, IF you know what you're doing).
Well, ok, if tritanium would ever go above 5 or 6 ISK per unit, THEN you could say mining in highsec MIGHT become a bit more profitable, but really, not before that.
And no matter how you look at it, it STILL is the most boring activity you can do right now.
___

So, let me ask you this of all the newcomers:
What ever made you think MINING was a GOOD idea as an alternative means of funding for your PvP habit ?
I mean, seriously, I want to know that, what possibly could you have read or done to think that ?
Was it a person ? Was it pre-conceived notions ? Was it some guide or wiki or something like that ?

Villard Wheel is not a person!

2008-04-11T22:08:00.001+01:00

Just because I made a new alt and I'm already sick of seeing this question:

Making Mountains of Molehills (5 of 10) Walkthrough.
Required Items: Perpetual Motion Unit I Blueprint, Datacore-Basic Civilian Tech, Datacore-Elementary Civilian Tech, Civilian Data Interface

Place the items in your ship and fly to Scheenins IV - Chemal Tech Factory.
Take the items and place them in the ITEMS storage area.
Right click on the blueprint and scroll down to INVENTION and select it.
Then you PICK AN INSTALLATION.
Then left click on this station and then left click on a free Invention slot.
Then click USE ASSEMBLY LINE.
The screen should go back to the begining. Press OK.
Press ACCEPT QUOTE and wait 5 minutes.
After 5 minutes press SCIENCE & INDUSTRY and then press GET JOBS. Click your item and press DELIVER.
Put the blueprint in your ship and fly back to Clellinon and manufacture the item.

Fleet self-invites

2008-03-28T13:58:00.002Z

Fleet self invites are still a bit of a misnomer; you do still need to be invited to them by someone, but at least you don't have to do it individually anymore.

The old way was to set up a fleet with someone and invite people who wanted to join one by one once they had requested that you do so. Now you can post a general invitation and let people click that invitation to join the fleet, putting the work in their hands.

To set up a self-invite fleet:

1: Start a fleet. You can either choose to invite someone or you can rt-click yourself and form a fleet of one (unfortunately you still need someone else to get gang boosts, or I'd be in a fleet all the time).

2: Rt-click the little triangle on your new fleet window and set the channel to self-invite. You are given two options: corp or alliance (if your corp is in an alliance).

3: Go to the channel you want to invite from, rt-click your name or your avatar and click channel->post fleet invitation. Don't forget to tell everyone what the invite is for!

Step 3 will work no matter who you are in the fleet. Remember that new people may be entering the channel all the time, so in case of disconnects or new people you might wish to repost the invite every few minutes.

Send In The Clones

2008-03-20T12:14:00.004Z

OK some of this post is, I feel, a little out of the reach of newer players, but people are asking about it, so here goes:

In Eve-Online you are immortal, in a sense. Now I don't want to go too much into the philosophy of it (surely when you're dead, you're dead?) but in Eve part part of the reason that entering that most dangerous of professions, pod pilot, is so popular is that you become effectively immortal. This is because we have access to clones.

There are two types of clone (or rather two uses of a clone since they use the same technology):

Medical Clones

Medical Clones are imprinted with a subconscious link to you so that when you die your consciousness merely snaps back to your clone, often on the other side of the galaxy. They have to be updated regularly or you will lose 10% of your memories (skillpoints) when this happens.

Go to a medical bay (in a station that has one, not all do) and ensure that your clone is up to date right now if you haven't done so already. There's one at our HQ in Vellaine, for instance. The default clone stores only 900k sp so buy yourself the next one up from your current skillpoints, or two up if you are training fast. You also have the choice to move your medical clone to somewhere more convenient, once created.

Note that your clone is a physically separate creation from you, this is not teleportation, so any implants you had in will be lost. Medical clones are a pod pilot's incentive to do the job, so they are available to anyone, no matter what your standings.

Jump Clones

Jump clones are used for deliberate moving around between clones. Again the actual technology is the same but since this is purely for convenience there are more restrictions attached, so they are generally referred to by the different name. Train infomorph psychology to be able to use a jump clone and you will have the skill needed to jump your mind from one clone to another. Since this takes a lot out of you psychologically it can only be performed once every 24 hours.

Again, your clone is physically separate to you so any implants you had at the time will be left behind (not lost, as your old body stays where it was). Some people use jump clones for this very reason, to leave behind expensive implants when they are about to do something dangerous. Others just use them to effectively teleport themselves between two widely separate bases of operations.

Training needs to be suspended, and of course you need to be at a clone bay to perform this, so most times that means you need to be in a station (some very large ships have clone bays but I wouldn't worry about that for now). You also need to not have a medical clone at the same station, as resources are limited and even the most patient of station managers won't dedicate two bays to the same pilot (if you attempt to have two clones at the same station one will be destroyed to make room). Jump clones are created at stations with medical bays but by flying them around you can have one wherever you like, there doesn't need to be a medical bay there to perform a jump.

Now for the bad news. Extra clone spaces are limited so station managers only allow space for them to their favourite pilots. That means you need a corp or faction standing of at least 8.0 with the corporation or faction owning the station to be able to create one. For many people this means that jump clones are out of reach for a good long while. However player-owned-station owners can set your standings at whatever level they wish, so you may be able to talk someone into letting you set one up. Try placing an Ad in the wanted forum, or having a look in the sell orders forum, as people sometimes offer this service for a fee, or join a corp with high standings already, or their own POS.

Pics From Kerberan

2008-03-20T11:20:00.003Z

The first of, I hope, many pictures have come in. These are from Kerberan who promises me many more. Now I just need to find him to take some pics of my ship...

Pretty Pictures please

2008-03-18T12:36:00.002Z

I've been feeling this blog lacks colour and as I'm currently restricted to classic content I'm sending out a general call for pictures.

If any corp or alliance members have any pictures from a premium version of Eve send them to me and I'll publish the best on here. I will crop the pictures but for sake of size should be converted to jpeg format, and should preferably show something relevant (ie not just your ship), and should be taken with the UI disabled (ctrl-tab).

Send pictures to tranka@blueyonder.co.uk.

Patching for Beginners

2008-03-14T02:10:00.002Z

I was going to write something about patching, but i found out someone else had gotten there first. Never one to reinvent the wheel, here it is:

Patch days And You

Notes on the Major Patch Note Changes

2008-03-12T01:04:00.004Z

The major points in the patch, with comments:

-When undocking, you now undock at maximum velocity in a 0-15 degree angle from the undock point to ease congestion around undock points.

As detailed in PrismX's Blog: Drones, Fighters, Shuttles and Rookie Ships in space will be deleted on the first of every month unless within proximity to a Starbase. Anchored containers will have a 30 day timer from the last time they were interacted with and will be deleted when the timer expires unless in proximity to a Starbase.
Character Creation and New Player Experience - This is great news, especially for miners, and those wishing to use can for advertisements (the older, out of date ones will be swept away), but more generally as all those hundreds of cans must cumulatively cause a massive lag on the servers. I wait with bated breath to see just how much quicker it will make everything seem.

All windows have had a welcome page added; a short text explaining the window. - That could get annoying.

The description of the "Social" (skill) has been clarified. - Clarified how?

Ship resistances have been changed as detailed in Zulupark's Blog. - This is easy to say, but doesn't help a lot just reading through the notes. From memory this means that all explosive resistances have been reduced by 10%

The Apocalypse gains +5tf, +1000mw and +1500 capacitor capacity. The capacitor capacity ship bonus has been replaced by a 7.5% bonus to large energy turret optimal range per Amarr Battleship skill level.
The Omen and Zealot now have 5 turret slots (+1 turret).
The Moa and Eagle now have 5 turret slots (+1 turret).
The Ferox now has 6 turret slots (+1 turret) and 1075mw (+75mw).
The Raptor now has 3 turret slots (+1 turret) and loses 4mw.
Jump freighters skill now adds 5% agility instead of 5% velocity per level.
Jump freighter bonus to hull hit points has been extended to also add the same bonus to armor and shield.
Jump freighter base cargo capacity has been increased by 25%.
- All fairly self explanatory, making crappy ships half workable.

Drones have been issued a memory upgrade, and will no longer forget what their 'engage' target was after 60 seconds.
-Like a lot of people I did wonder, but I put this down to my imagination.

Mining drones have gained some more shield, armor and hull hitpoints.
-But still pull them in when you see a pirate coming, right?

NPCs

Dungeon NPCs are now able to react based on your standing towards them.
-Now this one worries me. Does this mean that if I warp into a pirate mission they will all aggro me at once, or does it just mean if I'm in a gang and I have the lowest standing it will be me that a new spawn decides to target? Or neither? 'Able to react' is distinctly unhelpful information.

Several missions have been fixed to spawn correctly.
-Again, what missions, where?

Science and Industry

There are now additional settings and filters that can be used both in the Browse and the Details tab of the Market window. You can filter by skills (only items that you have the skills to use), by CPU and powergrid (only items that can be fitted on the current ship, not taking into account already fitted modules), by solar system security, buy/sell order deviation and so on.
-Excellent change, I was only wishing out loud in chat the other day that you could do this.

Self Invite Fleets
It is now possible to allow people to invite themselves to your fleet. The fleet boss can put the fleet into self-invite mode for his corporation or alliance. Anyone in the fleet will then be able to right click on his entry in a chat window to post the invitation into that channel. This feature is very convenient to quickly set up fleets.
- Excellent for corps that do a lot of group flying. This is one of the first things we will be using.

Overview Tabs and Bracket Filters
It is now possible to apply the same settings that are available to overview to inflight brackets (brackets are the icons that appear over items in space).
It is now possible to assign overview and bracket settings to tabs in the overview window which allow fast switching between different overview and brackets setting profiles.
A new tab can be generated by right clicking a existing tab and selecting the Add Tab option or by using the Overview Tabs option in the Overview Settings. To create a bracket filter you create a Overview Settings profile with the icons you want to see in space and assign it to an Overview Tab as a Bracket Filter.
In order to quickly show all brackets you can use the default key combination alt-z which toggles all brackets on and off. The alt key no longer shows all brackets.
Electronic Warfare Effects shown in Overview
You can now see all hostile Electronic Warfare Effects from other players or NPCs against your ship in the Overview (if the enemy ship appears on your overview).
You can turn off showing these indicators in the Overview Settings, each Electronic Warfare Effect can be toggled.
-These, apart from the ship changes if you happen to fly one of the ships affected, are probably the most important changes for this patch. The cumulative effect of all of that is that you will be able to set a tab up so by the click of a mouse you will be able to see only those ships that are using EW on you, and despatch them first. No more guessing or quinting to see faint trace lines. Ewarriors beware, we're coming to get you!

The Items and Ships windows will now remember their sizes and open/closed states properly. -Hopefully this means that the fixed items and ships window will not blank out when you change ships anymore.

The EVE client now communicates to the Xfire chat client how many EVE players are online. -Hmm, Xfire might be worth looking at, if you can use it for chat or voice even if eve goes down and use it ingame too.

To bring equality to the world, if your character is female then you will now have a female corpse when podkilled. -Hmm. Given the 100% male language used by agents I think it takes more than this to bring equality to Eve.

The LP store now automatically reloads when the filters are changed.

So overall some useful new toys to play with. Now excuse me while I reset all my settings. Dammit.

"The morning according to Eve"

2008-03-12T00:45:00.001Z

Courtesy of dragonrider000:

Player: brush teeth
Eve: you don’t have a toothbrush
Player: buy Electric Toothbrush I
Eve: are you sure? that item is 58 jumps away
Player: fly to item
Eve: autopilot disabled. waypoint reached
Player: dock
Eve: docking permission requested
Player: dock
Eve: docking permission requested
Player: dock
Player: dock
Player: dock
Eve: docking request...... accepted
Player: buy Electric Toothbrush I
Player: equip Electric Toothbrush I
Eve: you don’t have the skills necessary to use that item
Player: buy Teethbrushing
Player: train Teethbrushing I
Eve: skill training complete
Player: equip Electric Toothbrush I
Eve: you don’t have the skills necessary to use that item
Player: buy Electric Toothbrush Operation
Player: train Electric Toothbrush Operation I
Eve: skill training complete
Player: equip Electric Toothbrush I
Eve: insufficient power

Can I shoot them please?

2008-03-12T00:12:00.002Z

There are some instances where you can legitimately shoot another playe in Eve, or be shot. The rules vary depending on where you are:

Hi-Sec:
You can shoot another player who has stolen from you, or has already shot at you, without alerting the authorities. In this case the player will appear as flashing red in your overview. The exception is if the player is in a pod. You cannot destroy a pod in hisec legally unless you are at war with that corp.

Do not confuse flashing red with having a red minus by their name (you, your corp, or your alliance does not like them), having a skull by their name (they have a bounty on them), or having their name coloured orange or yellow (they have a negative security status). If you are at war with a corp you will probably show the red minus by a players name but that does not mean that everyone with a red minus is a legitamate target.

Failure to adhere to these rules will result in a security standing drop and Concord showing up and blowing you up, pod and all, at varying speeds related to the security of the system (fastest in 1.0). You will not win against Concord. You can, of course, shoot someone expecting to be blown up for it, but you had better do a hell of a lot of damage with your first shot or it'll be fairly pointless.

Low security space:
Shoot anyone you like but you will take a security standing hit for it and if you are near some sentry guns you will get shot at for it (but you have better chance of lasting against guns than Concord).

0.0:
Shoot anyone you like, no sec standing hit, the only consequences are political.

Why join a corp?

2008-03-11T18:41:00.005Z

The advantages of joining a player run corp are numerous, but there are disadvantages. The advantages are:

1) The corp hangar.
The corp has a joint hangar, accessed via any station that has an office of your corp, where you can share things like ammo and mods that other people no longer want, or has been deliberately manufactured the the corp members.

2) Looting and Salvaging.
You have the right to open and tractor the wrecks and cans of anyone in your corp, whether they are online or not.

3) Standings.
NPC corps are often set to red (i.e. shoot on sight) status by player run corps because, as they can't be have war declared upon them for their actions, NPC corps become a haven for greifers (pirates who attack others just to annoy other players rather than economic or political gain). Also NPC corps never achieve the standings needed to set up a POS, or set up jump clones (although larger player corps have trouble with this too).

4) Teamwork.
Probably the most important one, player run corps tend to have a strong sense of teamwork and are more willing to invest time in new players. People in NPC corps have very little to gain from this, and tend to be very solo players with little interaction between players.

SAFE forums

2008-03-11T13:22:00.002Z

I have rather shamefacedly signed up for the forums, finally. If you have already, or if you can do so, please sign in on the topic below so I know who I can talk to on there.

SAFE Forums PVE Sign-in.

Secret Agents

2008-03-11T02:23:00.005Z

Finding the best agent for you shouldn't be a mystery. Don't expect a mail telling you to change agent, this is something you have to check out for yourself. There is a very simple procedure for finding the best agent you can use:

1) Open Character Sheet.
2) Open standings.
3) Scroll down to corporations, click the top one. If corporations is just about empty you can also follow the same procedure for the top faction and pick a good sounding corp within it (if you want kill missions you should be able to find one that sounds as though it gets involved in combat).
4) Click the agents tab.
5) Expand the list, and it will show which agents are available to you.

Do enough missions that your standings get high enough that more agents become available to you. If this is happening too slowly for you train the 'social' skill to gain standing more quickly and train the skill 'connections' for a percentage gain on your current level of standings. Having zero standings before skills and connections at 4 used to enable you to access minimum quality level 2 agents without having done any missions at all; now you will have to do at least one or two.

Use the best agent you can for the level you can safely complete. Agent quality has no reflection on mission difficulty, just on your rewards for it. For mission types see bio info below. Also bear in mind that lower security systems give better rewards, but once you are into .4 or below you can be shot at by passing players too. Agents close to lowsec space but not in it may ask you to go there once in a while, don't forget you can always turn down one mission every 4 hours, but if an agent is doing this a lot it might be worth looking at a change of agent. If, on the pther hand, you prefer the rewards of missioning in lowsec find an agent deep within it to be safer; it's the border between high and low that carries the most risk.

For a database for comparing agents across eve I recommend the database at eveinfo.com under links, out of game. Alt-tab is your friend!

Administration: 50% Kill, 50% Courier
Advisory: 34% Kill, 66% Courier
Archives: 5% Kill, 90% Courier, 5% Trade
Astrosurveying: 40% Kill, 30% Courier, 25%
Mining,5% Trade
Command: 97% Kill, 3% Courier
Distribution: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Intelligence: 85% Kill, 15% Courier
Internal Security: 95% Kill, 5% Courier
Legal: 50% Kill, 50% Courier
Manufacturing: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Marketing: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Mining: 5% Kill, 85% Courier, 10% Mining (II)
Production: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Public Relations: 34% Kill, 66% Courier
R&D;*: 0% Kill, 50% Courier(S), 50% Trade
Security: 90% Kill, 5% Courier, 5%Trade
Storage: 5% Kill, 95% Courier(L)
Surveillance: 95% Kill, 5% Courier

Learning to learn

2008-03-11T00:06:00.005Z

People often ask what the most important skill to learn is when they start eve. The short answer is everything. You are always better learning lots of skills to level one or two, so you can fit the modules you need, than training a single skill to level 5. Take a look at my skill tree and you can see how many skils are useful even just for combat. Use the time when you are online to train these quick skills to basic levels, or you will get very bored waiting for the longer ones.

So what are the longer ones you need? Well when you start, and assuming you are here for the long haul, your learning skills. Take a look at the learning skills in the market. There are specific skills that boost all five attributes, and then more advanced versions for you to train once you have the original ones to level 4.If you look at the attributes of any skill you will see listed the two attributes that affect how quickly that skill trains, one primary and one secondary. Now take a look at the attributes of the learning skills themselves. All the basic learning skills are affected by the attributes Intelligence and Memory, logically enough. Alternate between these two first (the skills are Analytical Mind and Instant Recall) then go on to do the rest of the learning skills, before going on to the advanced one.

DON'T train either set of skills to level 5. Back in the bad old days you HAD to train the basic ones to l5 to be able to access the advanced, now you don't have to. the level 5 skills really aren't worth your time unless you plan to be around for at least 3 years. Plan out the longest set of skill training you can think of in Evemon if you don't believe me. Level 4 is worthwhile though, especially if your going to be doing pvp and risking implants.

You can also speed things up still further by training cybernetics a little and putting some attribute implants. +2 implants (Beta) can be picked up very cheaply just about anywhere.

After you've trained these skills... Well, that very much depends what you want to do. Download Evemon and set yourself an individualised plan for whatever items and ships you want to be able to use.

And if you are still confused, you can always ask. Most of all remember: you can always switch skills without losing any skillpoints. If you know your current skill is going to finish before you can next be online, switch to something longer. Never, ever, leave nothing training.

Golden Rules

2008-03-06T19:48:00.002Z

This is a sticky on the New Citizens forum, thought they were worth adding here though. Mail me if you think of any more.

* You are not safe in 1.0 security space. CONCORD is there to punish, not to protect. Get used to the idea.
* In most cases, the only way to be 100% safe from agression inside the game is to be docked in a station. Being cloaked in a secret safespot could work too.
* Never fly something (or with something in the cargo) you can't afford to lose. Yes, not even in highsec.
* Never grant corporation rights to stuff you can't afford to lose either. No exceptions.
* People offering free stuff ? Probably traps. Use caution.
* Free stuff usually isn't. Not even minerals you mine yourself.
* If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Paranoia pays off here. Double-check everything.
* Scamming and unethical behaviour some would consider griefing is not only allowed, it is encouraged and rewarded by the game mechanics.
* Harrasment or real-life threats however aren't, and you can get a shiny ban for them. Learn the difference.
* If you lose stuff, it's ALMOST ALWAYS YOUR FAULT. Really, only yours.
* More expensive stuff is not always better stuff.
* Slightly better stuff usually costs many times more as slightly worse stuff. Choose wisely.
* T2 is usually cheaper and better as best named, but harder to fit. Sometimes it's not better. Other times it's not cheaper. And occasionally, neither cheaper nor better.
* Showinfo and Variants->Compare are your best friends. Use it on all stuff you can.
* There is always heavy lag in Jita and other trade hubs. But then again, you almost always find what you might need there, and can get better prices for the stuff you want to sell fast. So, it might be worth the risk of getting stuck there. Just know you COULD get stuck there.
* Just HAVING ISK doesn't matter all that much, it's MAKING ISK that's important. If you BOUGHT your ISK (either "illegally" from some site, or from a valid GTC trade), expect to soon be parted with all of them.
* Total skillpoints count doesn't matter much either, it's level of relevant skills to the current situation that does. Yes, that does mean a 2 mil SP combat-oriented newbie could badly beat up a 60 mil SP industry-oriented veteran.
* ALWAYS check your clone before you undock.
* ALWAYS check your ship insurance before you undock. If it's a T2 ship however... not THAT important.
* There are no "solopwnmobiles" in EVE. Everything you can fly blows up if it's shot hard enough.
* All other things being equal (experience, skills), superior numbers more often win a fight rather than superior ship value. However, things are hardly ever equal.
* There is no such thing as "a fair fight" or "an unfair fight". There's only "a fight". Circumstances are irrelevant.
* Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
* Just because you CAN fly something doesn't mean you SHOULD.
* With enough skills and experience, ship size really doesn't matter all that much.
* If you logoff in space without a PvP timer, you're only safe after 2 minutes... and then only until you log back in. If you logoff with a PvP timer, it's at least 15 minutes. Bottom line, once a fight started, don't logoff. You'll only die anyway.
* If you PvP long enough, you WILL lose your ship. It's only a matter of where and when.
* Just because some character is just a few minutes old doesn't mean he's a newbie. Many people have alts. The reverse is also possible, people come back after very long breaks, and characters are sold. You could see year-old newbies around too.
* Skills that take less than 1 day to train are short skills. Over one week is long.
* You're in this game for the LONG HAUL. Don't expect to do something meaningful in the grand scheme of things in the first day of your first trial account ever.

Signature Image

2008-03-06T16:29:00.004Z

In case anyone wants to use one I made a sig image. Feel free to make alternatives, or use it on your own sig, preferably with a link here, like this:

[url">http://pve-log.blogspot.com/"][img]http://www.coliterate.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/images/sig1.gif[/img][/url]

Ship Building

2008-03-06T13:35:00.002Z

As a perk to members I am providing free T1 manufacturing services at our HQ. To get any item or ship manufactured:

1. Buy a station container at HQ and put your name on it. Don't password it.
2. Drop off the needed 'perfect' amount of minerals and a blueprint (or copy) into the container.
3. Drop the container off into the 'Manufacturing' hangar.
4. Send me a mail telling me you have items to manufacture.
5. When I am next on I will set the items building. When complete I will drop the items, the container and the blueprint off into your hangar.

Old Bio Info

2008-02-21T13:50:00.005Z

Once upon a time when there used to be way more room in our Bios than there is now we would carry a load of information around with us, most of which we were sick of seeing anyway, but some of which was very useful. For the sake of those newer players who may not have seen it before here it is in full:

Amarr Radar White Noise
Caldari Gravimetric Spatial Destabilizer
Gallente Magnetometric Ion Field
Minmatar Ladar Phase Inversion

1 AU = 150 mil km

----------------------------------------------
Damage types:
Guristas (Mercenary) - Kinetic / Thermal
Serpentis - Thermal / Kinetic
Blood Raider - Thermal / EM
Sansha's Nation - EM / Thermal
Angel Cartel - Kinetic / Explosive / Thermal
Minmatar Fleet - Thermal / Explosive
Minmatar Freedom Fighter - only Kinetic
Amarr Navy - EM / Thermal

----------------------------------------------Scanning Info-------------------------------------
1 au = 149.000.000 km
3 au = 447.000.000 km
7 au = 1.043.000.000 km
48 au = 7.152.000.000 km
Max Scanner Range = 14.413 AU - (2.147.483.647/149.000.000)

----------------------------------------------Mission types-------------------------------
Administration: 50% Kill, 50% Courier
Advisory: 34% Kill, 66% Courier
Archives: 5% Kill, 90% Courier, 5% Trade
Astrosurveying: 40% Kill, 30% Courier, 25%
Mining,5% Trade
Command: 97% Kill, 3% Courier
Distribution: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Intelligence: 85% Kill, 15% Courier
Internal Security: 95% Kill, 5% Courier
Legal: 50% Kill, 50% Courier
Manufacturing: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Marketing: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Mining: 5% Kill, 85% Courier, 10% Mining (II)
Production: 5% Kill, 95% Courier
Public Relations: 34% Kill, 66% Courier
R&D;*: 0% Kill, 50% Courier(S), 50% Trade
Security: 90% Kill, 5% Courier, 5%Trade
Storage: 5% Kill, 95% Courier(L)
Surveillance: 95% Kill, 5% Courier

----------------------------------------------Complexes----------------------------------------
1/10 Frigate
2/10 Destroyer
3/10 Cruiser
4/10 Battle Cruiser
5/10 Battle Ship

----------------------------------------------Sec Status----------------------------------------

-1.5 or greater can enter all systems
-2.0 or worse cannot enter 1.0 systems
-2.5 or worse cannot enter 0.9 systems
-3.0 or worse cannot enter 0.8 systems
-3.5 or worse cannot enter 0.7 systems
-4.0 or worse cannot enter 0.6 systems
-4.5 or worse cannot enter 0.5 systems
-5.0 or worse are outlaws and can be attacked anywhere.

You cannot pod or be podded anywhere in empire without Concord being alerted unless at war.

Glossary

2008-02-18T21:06:00.016Z

I've put together a list of some of the more confusing terms in Eve for the beginner. Let me know if you think of any more.

AB – Afterburner
Active Tank - A defensive layout that relies on capacitor-using modules
AF - Assault Frigate
AFAIK - As far as I know
Aggro - Aggressive behaviour, usually from NPC's, i.e. being targeted and attacked
Aggress - To aggro someone (qv)
Align - Orienting on a warpable object to reduce time to enter warp.
Alliance - A group of corporations with similar goals
Alt - A second character controlled by the same player, usually on another account
AP - Autopilot
AU - Astronomical Unit- the distance from Sol to Earth is 1AU, about 149 million km
BC - Battlecruiser
BCS/BCU – Ballistic control system (Don’t ask)
Blasterthron - A Megathron that uses blasters as its primary weaponry
Blob - Large group of ships that stay together for mutual defence
Blue - Is friendly with
BPC - Blueprint Copy
BPO - Blueprint Original
BS - Battleship
Bubble - A zone in which ships cannot warp
Camp - Waiting at a static point to engage ships entering an area
Can/Jetcan - Jettisoned cargo cannister, lasts for up to 2 hours
Carebear – player who avoids PVP
CCC - Capacitor Control Circuit
CNR – Caldari Navy Raven
Concord - NPC hisec police
Corp - Corporation, the term for a permamanent group of players
CS - Command Ship
Cyno - Cynosural Field; Used for creating jump portals for capital ships.
DC - Disconnected
Dessie - Destroyer
DDD - Doomsday device, Huge smartbomb for attaching to Titan class ships
Decc - To Declare war on someone's corporation
Dessie - Destroyer class ship
DPS - Damage per second
EANM - Energized adaptive nano membrane
ECM - Electronic counter measures, used for breaking target lock
ECCM - Used for strengthening target lock
EW - Eloctronic Warfare
Faction - The NPC equivalent of an alliance, or a type of advanced mod made by it.
Farm - To repeat a profitable mission or plex without completing it, causing respawn.
FC - Fleet commander
Flag - To mark as a target
ftw - For The Win
FYI - For your information
Gang - Archaic term for fleet, still used by older pilots
Gank - Destroy quickly and completely
GC - Gatecamp (ships waiting to attack visitors to a system)
Geddon - Armageddon (Amarr Battleship)
GF - Good fight
GSC - Giant Secure container
GTC - Game Time Code
Gyros - Gyrostabilisers (Turret Damage Mod)
HAC – Heavy Assault Cruiser
HAM - Heavy Assault Missile
HIC – Heavy Interdictor Cruiser
HML – Heavy Missile Launcher
IGB - In-game Browser
IIRC - if I recall correctly
Indy - Industrial Ship
Inty - Interceptor
Itty - Iteron (Gallente Industrial with a large hold, usually Iteron 5)
ISD - Forum and Chat volunteers
Jet - Jettison
Jetcan - See Can
JC Mining - Mining into a can instead of just your hold for longer periods
Jita - The main economic hub of Eve. Almost everything can be bought there, but the prices may be higher than elsewhere. Station 4-4 in particular is the main store.
Kessie - Kestrel
Kiting - Running away from NPC's so they are forced to follow you, to manage aggro.
Jumpclone - A clone you can 'teleport' to.
LAR - Large armour repairer
LSE - Large shield extender
Lowsec - Space without Concord or Alliance protection, 0.1 to 0.4.
LP - Loyalty Points, given by agents as rewards, redeemable for offered items
Main - The character you play most, usually with the greatest SP
Mod - Modules, things that alter your ships capabilities, that fit in the main ship slots.
MCC - Melted Capacitor console (Item of salvage, one of the most valuablebut also common)
Mom/MS - Mothership (Ship Class)
MWD – Microwarp Drive
Myrm - Myrmidon (Gallente Drone Specialist Battlecruiser)
M3 - Metres Cubed, a unit of volume
Nanophoon - Typhoon Battleship fitted for speed tanking. Multiple variations also exist.
Noob - New player (The length of time/experience required to graduate from noob is etirely in the eye of the beholder)
Nerfed - Deliberately made less good
NBSI - Not Blue Shoot It
Nos – Nosferatu (energy vampires or drainers)
NPC – Non-Player Character
NRDS - Not Red Don't Shoot
Ofc - Of course
Oic – Oh, I See
Omw – On My Way
Oog – Out Of Game
Passive Tank - A defensive layout that requires minimal or zero capacitor
PDU – Power Diagnostic Unit
PewPew - Combat, usually PVP
Plex - 1. Player License Extension, an ingam method of purchasing game time
2. Deadspace Complex, either the result of exploration or fixed in space.
Podded - Having your pod blown up, so that you are respawned in station
Popped - A ship blowing up, e.g. 'I was popped, and podded, in seconds.'
POS – Player Owned Structure
PVE – Player Versus Environment
PVP – Player Versus Player
QFT - Quite F****ing True!
Rats – NPC Pirates
Rax - Thorax (Gallente Cruiser)
Red - An enemy; 'A is red to B'
Rig - Unremovable modules, like implants for ships
RL - Real life, whatever that is
RP - Roleplay OR research points, dependant on context
RMR - Previous Eve expansion that changed a lot of Eve, especially PVE play
Scram - To warp scramble, qv scrammed
Sniper - Ship suited to and fitted for long range combat
SISI - The Eve test server, correctly known as Singularity
Stabs – usually warp core stabilisers
SP - Skillpoints
Tank - Verb 'To Tank': To fit your ship for taking damage.
tbh - To be honest...
Toon - A character, usually spoken of a third person, implying no knowledge of alt or main status
ty - Thank you
wd - Well done
Wb – Welcome back
Web - To use a stasis webifier on someone, drastically slowing their speed
WoWer - Player of the game which must not be named.

Corp direction

2008-02-17T16:25:00.002Z

There are many different ways that a corp can go. It can become a tight-knit roaming band, a travelling group of mercenaries, or a single system police force. It can be a disparate, loosely connected group of jobbing industrialists. It can stretch several constellations and regions or it can spend its whole time around a single gate.

I have some very specific ideas about how I want this corp to develop. I would like to know what you want. Mail me ingame or talk to me on channel PVE.

Safe and fast travelling in Eve:

2008-02-10T01:39:00.002Z

If you don't want to be popped on your way anywhere make sure your route doesn't enter low security space. Click on map, click the autopilot tab, and click 'Prefer Safer'.

DONT use autopilot!
Q: "you cant expect me to do it manually right?"
A: "actually yes, and its rather simple"

1) First step is to set your destination (you'll also need to be in space (undocked))
next open your overview settings (its the right facing triangle, next to the words "OVERVIEW" funnily enough on your overview)
2) Click deselect all (down the bottom)
3) Open "Celestial" then scroll down to find "Stargate" (click the checkbox so its "ticked")
4) Close the window, and once again click the right facing triangle, and click "Save current config as..." and call it "Nav". You can set this up in a second tab.
Now if you have a destination set you will notice a yellow stargate in your overview
right click it
5) Click "Warp to within 0m"
Voila! you warp directly within jump range. Just saved you about a minute per jump.

Salvaging.

2008-02-08T19:13:00.001Z

We often allow salvagers to pick the bones of our missions if we aren't going to do it ourselves; after all, with the profession of probing and salvaging becoming more common we would rather it at least went to our friends.

In general our rules for team mission running are as follows; If you are running a mission with someone, the mission owner decides who gets to salvage the mission. If you are salvaging a mission for someone the loot is yours, however if you are asked to save anything specific please do so. This, however will not be enforced by the corp, it is an agreement between players.

If you are in the corp and you collect any junk mods please dont reprocess them yourself, save them or put them into corp hangar for reprocessing by a specialist. They will be turned into ammo for corp use. Rigs and ships can also be manufactured at cost for our friends from salvage and loot with high efficiency, ask me for details ingame.

If you are a new player and want to start salvaging the easiest and cheapest way is with a destroyer. Put up to 5 tractors and at least 3 salvagers in high (the exact mix you can fit will depend on your skills), a microwarp drive or afterburner and some capacitor rechargers in mid, and cargo expanders in low.

Have fun and go make yourself some ISK!

Oops. But Yay.

2008-02-02T01:19:00.002Z

It has been soooooo long since I updated this, Im quite embarassed. Just noticed that it now works in the ingame browser though so I feel I ought to say hello. However the corp is still open, I've been away and come back, Drunkminer is still drunk and Yoshi has abandoned us. I gave 0.0 a try but didn't like it, though I am still open to moving back at some point in the future for the right corpies.

We are open to all players if you want though we mostly fly solo and help out younger players when they need it; the only reason to join really is if you want the security of an alliance but still want to live tax free, although we plan to start running L5 missions in a fleet as soon as they become economically worthwhile. I also have perfect production efficiency and will build ships for free for corp members, and we have a large stock of free missiles. If you just need help in a mission come to the PVE channel: click on channels and mailing lists to your left, click join and type PVE and enter. Simple as that.

2007-07-06T11:44:00.000+01:00

Well as I got killed yesterday this seems like a good time to start a new blog, something I've been meaning to do for a while.

Before you shed too many tears for me you should know that I was only in a destroyer at the time, salvaging and collecting bandit spurs in 0.4 when a pirate by the name of Dredx came along and saw an opportunity for an easy kill. I hope he has it posted on a killboard somewhere to show how proudly he killed a ship armed only with tractor beams. Anyway I stupidly didn't warp away immediately and he then promptly podded me so here I am. A couple of weeks ago I would have been really annoyed by that but since the advent of the LP shop the implants dont cost anywhere near as much to replace. Come to that, a couple of weeks ago you wouldn't have found me in 0.4 at all.

Still, the upside is that this means I have kill rights on Dredx. I do hope I meet him again.