Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Skill Training Completed

My gosh! What a change of pace from my past blogs! Yes... this blog is going to be an opinionated one instead of my usual "diary style" but its just such an important issue that I really feel like I must address it in a whole blog to itself.

The issue is, ALL THOSE PEOPLE THAT KEEP TELLING ME I WILL AMOUNT TO NOTHING IN EVE!!!!

Please don't take this the wrong way people who commented, I'm not singling you out! Not only have I gotten 3 comments telling me this but people have even IMed me telling me this. And it's not like they say it in a really negative way (even though it is a very negative thing to say) they honestly believe what they are saying and they are like trying to "warn" me.

The reasons that they say I will never amount to anything in EVE is this: They think that because the people who started on EVE day 1 have been training this whole time that anyone who has started later then day 1 will be gimped.

This does sound logical, because there is no way to catch up. However this is crap for a few different reasons.

Compare EVE to other MMOs, in those games is not the people who have been playing since day 1 generally going to be stronger then even a new person who quickly grinded to the top? Depending on which game their gear might not be as good as the newbie but likely they will have accumulated other treasures to show how far they have come.

In EVE it has become very obvious to me that REAL LIFE skills will always beat out in-game skills (and things like how strong your ship is). I noticed this in Lineage 2 a lot, the guilds who where the best organized did MUCH better in PvP even if they didn't have as good equipment! There are just many many factors OTHER then in-game skills in EVE that make the difference between success and failure.

But "You will still never be as good as them!" these people might still say to me. Again, not true! While it might take an impossibly long amount of time to train every skill in the game, you don't NEED every skill in the game!

For example, I am barely a month into the game and I am all ready about 6 weeks from getting my Mining Barge. This barge is what I will be using to mine in deep space! I don't need to have a HULK (about a year of training from now) to be a successful miner. I would much rather fly around and mine in deep space with a 6 million isk barge then I would a 200 million HULK.

Anyways I know this was ranty but I'm gunna go ahead and post it. ^^;;
Here is a picture of my fat ass hauler in the docking bay. :)

15 comments:

heartlessgamer said...

Do not ignore the warning. You have no idea how wrong you are. Player skill amounts to one thing in EVE; using the UI.

However, none of that will matter when a 2 million SP player faces off against a 10 million SP player.

I have more to say, but lack the time.

Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat said...

Bullshit. Basically your argument is, "You're too late. Give up all ready."

heartlessgamer said...

I'm not saying give up. Play to have fun, but don't for a second believe you can catch up. That is my complaint and it is a valid problem with EVE. You do honestly start so far behind that it significantly hurts your ability to play in later stages. You will hit a wall.

But by all means go ahead and prove me wrong :P

I'm sorry if this has sounded like an attack towards you... I really just wanted to give a fair warning message.

Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat said...

Anyways :* I love ya heartless. I like your blog, I'm happy to link you and be blogofriends. ;)

Anonymous said...

According to CCPs own statistics the average player in EVE stays 9-11 months (or is that old). So "catching up", if there even were anything like that, would be complete after 11 months. After that you would have more SP than the average player.

But... so what? I've been playing since April 2006, when already people were saying "ZOMG YUO WILLZ BE GIMP FOEWAAA!!!1" It's the biggest crap you could tell a new EVE player.

Why? Because it's a game.
A game works for you if you have fun.
You are good at a game, if it works for you.

And for that you do not need bazillions of SPs more than everyone else, you just have to find something that's fun to you and work on getting better at that. From my point of view, as the CEO of her corp, I'd say Kitty has already found that special thing to do in EVE. :)
There will always be people better than you at fighting, mining, trading, research, production, missioning and so on. But there will also always be people worse at what you do.
Just have fun while you do it, that's what it is all about.

On a completely unrelated note: I have 21 million SP, but could easily be killed by a 2 million SP char or two, under the right circumstances. SP are not everything in EVE.

Your blog rocks and I hope you put that (mine :P) Iteron III to good use. ;)

Iuvart

heartlessgamer said...

Iuvart,

I have heard similar speeches from several 10+ million SP players. Really, your response here is all I need to prove my point.

Oh, and I've killed plenty of big shot EVE players when I caught them in an inferior ship, but you don't see me here talking about how my "skill" owned them.

Anonymous said...

About cathing up with other players isn;t quite true imo either, When i first joined Eve there was players who started 6months before me who i have not only caught up with but took over in skill points. Yep Learning Skills +5 implants ftw, thing is a lot of player head out to 0.0 at some point and most these players dont use implants, i also spent long time in 0.0 but i have always used implants only +4 tho in 0.0.
Its good to wind up your ingame m8s about how they started 6months before you and have less skill points :)

Anonymous said...

I enjoy your blog Cow Nose. I started reading it from the beginning and just when I was about to start getting really excited about Lineage 2 again... you jump on the EVE wagon. You are definately NOT helping me with my Short Attention Span :) Anyway, don't let the man get you down, play how you want and as trite as it sounds... you are successful if you are having fun.

Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat said...

Thanks ender! Your comments are appreciated. Haha I know exactly what you mean about short attention span. :P Soemtimes I like to think of myself as a perma-noob because I never ever get to any sort of endgame! But that's OK I think I have started to realize that I really enjoy being a noob. Of course I have never gotten to "the top" so I can't comment on if the top is really fun too. :P

Anyways, you know if your serious about your blog ender I would love to trade links with you and join up on the blogosphere. You're definitely "Cownose approved" :D

Anonymous said...

Heartless is clueless.

I've got a character with 32.6 mil SP. All combat SP except for learning skills and the skills for piloting a freighter.

You'll catch up to me just fine.

Why? Because there are only so many SP that are relevant to a given ship type.

If you pick ONE T2 ship class, and you focus your skill plan, you'll be able to fly it at maximum ability in a reasonable period of time.

Especially if you pick ships like interceptors/interdictors that use small weapons.

It would only take someone about one year of training to be a MAX skill interceptor pilot, and *much* less time to be a GOOD interceptor pilot (i.e. ALL relevant skills to rank IV) interceptor pilot).

Anonymous said...

There is no actual "end game" in EVE. You can join into 0.0 alliance any time (most of them do have SP limits, but look for GoonSwarm pilots for example). You can be effective in big fleet combats with only 2mil SPs, easily.

Experience is what matters most and only way to get that is go out there. Ships and mods you can always train when you want a change.

Anyways, your blog was fun to read (EVE parts atleast). Keep it up =).

Anonymous said...

Its pretty much like any other game to be honest in that people ahead of you are gonna have higher skills.

The thing is the way the skill tree is a 50million skillpoint player will be skilled in a number of things but a 10million sp player might be better than the 50mill in one aspect making it so your still competitive.

Ive killed players alot older than me though so even skillpoints dont matter.

Anonymous said...

Man oh man...


Never catch up to the veterens in Eve?

Can't stack up against a 10 million SP player at 2 million SP?

what the heck...

I've been playing EVE for 2 years now, and when I was just a fledgling pvper, with a mere 5 million skill points, I declared war on a much larger corporation and ended up tanking 4 other guys with equal or more skillpoints and killing all of them in my dominix due to fittings.

It all boils down to knowledge of the game, knowledge of your ship, and knowledge of your enemies ships.

Skillpoints do help, but they do not gurantee any sort of victory, to assume so means you're the type of personality that cannot see past an obstacle and is very self-defeating.

I have 5 accounts now, 4 of them are in Band of Brothers, 1 of them I pvp on the frontlines in all major campaigns.

Kallei, the name I use to post this, is my industrialist/research character.

Kallei flies a freighter and she moves minerals around for our corporation to be used in production of a complete library of T1 BPO's.

This character has 20 million skill points and is ready to fly a carrier capital ship as well..

My point is, characters in eve can have a huge range of usefulnesses, you could have 40 million skill points and not even dabble in PVP skills too much.

I run 5 accounts and I nearly cover every aspect of the game, I am a multitasker, and an addict.

I have more money than some people with 60 million skillpoints, why?

It's called Drive and will to overcome odds.


Anywho, skillpoints arent like level's in WOW and EQ2, different game, different systems, get over that type of thinking.

o/

Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat said...

Amen to that kallei!!

Anonymous said...

Just let the "omgwtf you will be gimped" people talk. It's very possible for a new character to start carving him/herself a nice slice of profit and fun in the game.

You don't need 40 mill SP and a carrier to have fun; sure, you might not be able to fight that guy in his pimped out battleship, but hey, give it a few months and you will be able to after all.

I played since day 1. Then got bored, quit, and donated my account to a friend. I came back to EVE a few weeks ago with nothing but an 800.000 SP 'newbie' character, and 5000 ISK in my wallet.

Within a month, I managed to make enough to keep me flush in frigates, t2 guns, and basically kill stuff left and right -- even in 0.0. Actually being a 'noob' is an advantage; your ship/fitting is cheap because you can't fly better, yet a cheap ship (think Rifter w/AC's .. T1 all the way), can still be effective.

So screw the nay-sayers, and play EVE. Your e-peen does not matter in EVE, just your actions.