Ryu’s Musings – Eve Online

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Launch your dreams for galactic conquest faster and easier with an Amarr Explorer Starter Pack that includes the fast and reliable Sarum Magnate frigate, complete exploration equipment set to kit out your ship, a dozen critical skill books, Prototype Cerebral Accelerator skill booster, and 30 days of game time.

Explore. Build. Conquer. EVE Online immerses you in a sci-fi experience where your every action can have rippling effects across a massive online universe. Team with and compete against over 350,000 players in epic starship battles or wage economic warfare on the galactic player-controlled market.

Eve Online is one of my favourite MMO’s, but it’s not an easy game. Frankly it’s one of the hardest, infuriating and stressful games around. For the longest time there was a running joke about the learning curve of Eve, see the below picture:

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This graph, while drawn as a joke is actually pretty close to the truth. Most MMO’s are in the vein of WoW where you run around killing mobs to gain XP which levels you up and gives you power. The longer you play the more power you get until eventually everyone is on a levelish playing field and it pretty much becomes a hot button mashing game. Getting there requires players to play the game, when you log off that’s it it’s over.

Eve Online however is as different as you can get. There is no levelling per-say, rather you learn skills over time. The learning is constant over time, even when you’re logged out you keep learning. Technically you could never login, beyond to add skills, never undock and still end up with a high skill character.

The game itself does teach you the basic of the game, you’ve got a basic tutorial and then a series of career missions which walk you through the various career paths available to the player. It’s well worth completing all of these as there are several benefits. Firstly you get given a load of skill books that will save you a fortune, you’re also given several ships from the various ship classes, this again saves you a load of isk. However the biggest gain is that it takes you through how the game works, which is very important since once you leave this initial area all the gloves come off.

The game is visually impressive, there’s no denying that, and frankly after each update it gets more so as they tweak the game engine. Gate jumping for example now has a rather snazzy look to it, like you’re entering warp space looks amazing. The ship designs are all really well done, with shadows and lighting done amazingly well.

The best thing is the game caters to the both aspects of game style. PvE players can do missioning, which is essentially the usual questing from MMO’s, go to X area and kill Y mobs, or carry items from station a to station b. There’s also mining and manufacturing as well, which can be profitable later on. Finally we have open PvP, once your outside of the tutorial area there’s no safe area other than docked in a station. While flying around in space you’re a prime target, even when you think your safe in a dead space, you’re not. You can be tracked down through probing and attacked.

To prevent PvP becoming rampant and annoying CCP have it set up into sections, High Sec, Low Sec, Null Sec and Worm space.

High Security is 0.9 down to 0.5. What this means is that if you’re attacked in these areas Concord, the system police, will respond and blow the smeg out of those that attacked you. That of course wont matter to much to you since chances are you’ve already been blown up, but hey justice is grand Open-mouthed smile

The lower the security you go the longer it takes for Concord to respond. always bear this in mind when your flying around, since when your in 0.5 sec area while it’s still classed as High Security the perp who attacks you could and probably will escape before Concord gets there, unless they’re next to a gate which has it’s own security that will respond.

0.5 down to 0.1 is classed as Low Sec space, there are some rules to play by, but generally speaking pirates will attack you, hold you ransom, or frankly just blow you up for the hell of it. If you’re a new player you DO NOT want to go into the low sec space for any reason, unless your part of a corporation expedition. Frankly if you’re playing as a PvE  you want to stay in High Sec anyway.

0.0 is Null Sec and frankly I’ve avoided it ever since i started playing since there are no rules or anything in Null Sec, anything goes and usually does. Null Sec is full of pirate corporations and general rogues. If that’s the sort of play style you want or are interested in it’s worth joining some of the training corps. Bear in mind though that joining a pirate corporation can have severe repercussions on your standings with the major factions. Clearing those if it doesn’t work out for you is a long hard slog.

Worm Hole Space is player owned and rules are set by the corporation that has claimed it. Be very careful in these spaces, since like Null Sec anything can and will happen.

Eve is a slow burner, that actually appears to be a fast burner. What i mean is at first glance it appears easy to get into a big ship, in fact you can get into a cruiser in a day or so. However getting into a ship is the easy part of things, simply flying it out straight away will see you lose that ship. given the costs, it’s a quick way to go bankrupt. To build yourself a decent ship and get the supporting skills takes roughly 14 days to get it fully fitted. You can get it basic fitted in about 3 days.

While you’re waiting for this you complete the tutorials and career missions, then you move on to the Sisters of Eve Epic Arc. This Sister of Eve Arc is the only level 1 Epic Arc set of missions, the others are all level 4’s.

So what is an Epic Arc? Well like it sounds it’s a series of missions that tell a story, it’s considered ‘epic’ cause there’s a lot of them, and ‘arc’ cause, well it’s a story arc. Epic Arc’s a re generally a lot harder than normal missions, but also a lot more profitable. It’ll take you a while to complete the chain by which point you’ll be in your cruiser, which you’ll need to finish the last 2 missions since they’re damn hard. However this particular arc is designed for new comers, so it’s easier, and a good way to learn the game since it’s not as easy as the tutorial sections. At the end of the arc you’ll have made about 20mill isk, and that’s not including salvage which can run between 5-10mill isk depending on the markets.

from there you want to get yourself into a corporation, there are several training corps around that cover the various game aspects.

Yet despite how fun the game is you have to remember that this game isn’t as fast paced as the adverts make it out to be. A lot of the game is done in the meta game, using applications such as BattleHQ or Eve Fitting Tool to build your ideal ship, and EveMon to plan your skill builds. The actual combat is really about putting your builds to the test and seeing if they work, and if they don’t going back to the applications to tweak the build.

As a solo player the combat isn’t as fast paced as the adverts make it appear, in fact the combat is the weakest part of the game at lower levels. It’s rather anaemic, with weak sounds and lacking in depth and feel. Yet that changes in group combat, it’s very lively and hectic. what’s more it’s easy for new comers to get into the action, and what’s more be of use. It’s quite possible for a group of new comers to take down someone whose been playing since the beginning, which makes it unique among MMO’s

The other aspect that makes it unique is that not only is it one of the dew MMO’s that still requires you buy the base game and pay a subscription, but it also gives you expansion packs for free. At the time of writing there’s been some 13 expansion packs given free to the player base, just imagine if you only had to pay for the base WoW game and all the expansion packs were given to you for free.

Also, unlike WoW which has multiple servers, Eve Online is based in a single shard universe. So everyone is in the same universe, on the same server. This is unusual in and of itself, but not unexpected since there’s not the numbers of WoW. On average you can expect around 40k players online at any one time.

The main unique thing however is that despite requiring a subscription to play it’s totally possible to have the game pay for itself. this is possible due to CCP’s actions to counter gold selling, or in this case isk selling. They brought in secure trading which means that GTC (game time cards) could be bought and the code sold to another person through a secure trade. During the trade CCP’s system would verify the code, as well as take the isk from the person buying it and then do the transfer. this code can then either be added to the persons account as normal game time, or turned into PLEX and in game item that grants a 30 day game time when used. PLEX can be bought and sold on in game market. As such, once you start to earn enough isk you can buy these in-game  PLEX and add them to your account, never having to pay the subscription again.

There is of course one very important thing to consider when your looking at GTC and PLEX, they come at a premium. Normal subscription runs for £8.99 a month, where as a PLEX will cost you £12.99 and a 60 day GTC will set you back between £25 and £30, depending where you get it. That said, GTC these days is currently selling for 1.5billion isk, which means you get a great pay day if you buy one and sell it as a new character. So if your doing that you need to judge whether the cost is worth it.

Finally, always bear in mind that Eve Online is a time sink, it’s not like WoW or any other MMO where at best a few months will see you max level. Eve is years, and continually expanding with CCP adding new skills to the game, and new ships to learn to fly. If you’re able to accept this, and give the game a chance, it’s very rewarding and worth getting.

Eve does offer a trial, you get the game for 14 days, though with some restrictions on the skills you can learn which means you wont be able to fly certain ships. Also some restrictions on sending money and making contracts. There’s another trial, which active players can give you, which has the same limitations but runs for 21 days. If you sign up from one of these buddy invites, and do so through the Eve Online website the original invitee gains a free 30day PLEX. People who gain this PLEX usually turn around and pay the new comer anywhere between 450 to 550million isk.

If you buy a code from anywhere else, such as Steam or Green Man Gaming, then they get nothing. Though they can take advantage of getting the game significantly cheaper. Eve frequently goes on sale for £3.50

3 Comments

  1. if you give me your eve name i have a very set corp that i run like 3 members looking for more 🙁