Eve Online - My Addiction

Back at the beginning of 2009, I remember searching for something to entertain myself with in the world of online gaming.
I'd played many a computer game on my computer, my tastes varying quite a bit from RPG type of games of fantasy (Diablo 2, Sacred, Oblivion, Morrowind) to FPS games (Medal Of Honor, Call Of Duty, Fallout 3). I was searching for something online with other people however. I had been playing Myst Online, Uru Live (aka MOUL) when it had shut down (this was when it was hosted by GameTap. It's back now online, kept there by player donations, free and fun to play if you like exploring and puzzles).

Searching on the internet, the big things were World of Warcraft of Guild Wars, but I wasn't interested in those (my wife had played WoW for a while, and lost interest in it quickly). This is when I ran into the description of a game that intrigued me:

You basically are playing as space craft in a vast universe to explore.

Following the links, that is when I discovered Eve Online.
There was (and they still have) a 14 day free play trial period to try out the game.

What intrigued me was how steep of a learning curve this game has, and the many, many different ways to play it. There were so many ways to be in this game: mining asteroids, playing and manipulating the player driven market, mission running, exploring, being a pirate and attacking other players, you name it, they got it.

The other thing that hit me: You can play this game for free if you work at it. At first, you'll need to buy a PLEX (Player License Extension), which runs about $19.00 USD, and gives you 30 days of play. (or you can have an actual subscription that automatically charges your account if you want, but I would not recommend that based on what I'm about to say).

However, you are able to buy these PLEXs in game, using the game money (ISK)! This means if you work at it, earning your in game money, you can use it to buy that PLEX and keep playing, and you've not actually used real money out of your wallet to play!

The game is also not static. CCP changes things (sometimes good.....sometimes bad, heh) and add things to the game: New ships, new areas to explore (Worm Hole space), new things, New missions, etc.

Me undocking in my Caldari Navy Raven battleship for a mission:


There are many people who play this game from all over the world. One of my best friends I have I met on here and lives in Australia (so meeting on line can be kind of rough due to the time difference).

Doing this right now as I type this post, mining some Kernite and Veldspar in my Mackinaw:


I've done a lot of different things in this game: lived as a mission grinding Care Bear in High Sec space, lived in a Class 3 Worm Hole for a while, mining exotic asteroids and running Sleeper sites, ran level 4 missions in Low Sec just for the thrill of seeing if other players can track me down to kill me.

There have been a few times where I stopped playing for a while. Either real life interfered or I was bored (but only because I was too lazy to find something else to do). But I always seem to come back to this game and can't stop.
My wife is also addicted to this game. About a year after I started playing, she wanted to play too, and has ever since.



If you do ever decide to give Eve Online a try, there is something to remember, and it's VERY important:

"In Eve......trust No One."

Eve can make you very paranoid. I've seen people get ganked, had all their stuff stolen, etc, all because they forgot that line up there.

As I end this post, here's a low rez video I did not too long ago, showing me and my wife mission running on Eve Online:

reply to post by eriktheawful


It's possibly the greatest of all computer games due to it's sheer scope and the ability for pure nastiness. It's a whole world of it's own - i used to play, mostly care-bearing and then some corping before i felt i no longer had enough time to get what i wanted out of it.... the beauty is though that as the game continually develops and updates i may well return at some point later and find god knows what (i played pr-ambulation for example).

There was a fabulous con carried out by an assassin corp quite a few years ago that involved months of infiltration to the highest levels of of a prominent corp.

On top of the assassination, they managed to steal something in the region of tens of thousands of dollars worth of property from the targeted guild's storage iirc. When i read the story it just blew my mind!

When i update my PC in the indeterminate future, i'll probs have to find a way to make time to return to it.

It's pure survival of the sneakiest embodied through code. And the ships rock. Awesome!

ETA: it was "The Guiding Hand Social Club" - i dont have much time right now, but look it up if you aint aware of it.

reply to post by skalla


Ah! Yes that was the demise of "Bob". I was playing Eve when that happened.

Just recently (a couple of months ago?), there was a 3000 ship blob war in Null Sec....all because someone clicked on the wrong button by mistake! hehehehehehehe.

Rubicon is the next expansion, deploys November 19th. They are coming out with some new ships, and some new modules (including one that you can deploy while mission running.......and it tractor ins and salvages your wrecks for you while running the mission....amazing! I always have just run the mission, turned it in, then went back in my Noctis and salvaged the wrecks).

I still Care Bear mostly (fastest way for me to make ISK by myself), but I also jump in my Buzzard and go exploring in the more dangerous areas of space, just to see what there is to see (and sometimes find someone's T2 wreck that I'm able to find something in).

I have wanted to try this game and many others but the system req. are to high for me.
Firepiston

It is an excellent game. I have been playing for ten years now and despite the old vets saying "ahhh back in the day it was better because" overall they are wrong, its clearly a better game now than its ever been, especially for new starters - oh boy you wouldn't even imagine how much tougher it was to start out in '03/'04/'05.

I have met up with people in my local area who all turned out to be extremely normal (smart and fun) people and now i have been to visit people that have become very good friends, even over seas! EvE players tend to be older players than the "WoW" crowd which i think lifts the general gaming maturity a great deal - younger players dont have the patience to lean the complexity of the game.

There is so much to enjoy about eve that as long as you enjoy beautiful graphics and spaceships, you really cant go wrong. However do not expect this to be a "fly with a joystick" flight game, its far more about planning, building, creating friendships (and enemy's!) and the flying is actually done via ship commands, like simply direction, or "orbit", "approach" and "keep range" a target etc

Do not plan to try it for a month and expect to be flying around in a battleship, even if you are a market genius or an adept corp thief - you may be able to afford things that more experienced players will beat you with something half the size. So aim small for the start dont let your wallet mislead your decisions!

I play an evil pirate in low security systems, hunting down targets to kill and take their stuff

OP is a high sec bear eehhhhh? Prepare for the war dec! (haarahar, i joke)

Happy playing fellow EvErs and fly safe, but not too safe

I played for a year and am currently on a break, but I can give you one sound advice you should always follow; never, ever, fly with 100s of PLEX.

I've seen or heard about a couple of guys that got destroyed, and they were flying with that, or with billions worth of blueprint... lol

FirePiston
I have wanted to try this game and many others but the system req. are to high for me.

Firepiston

edit on 11-11-2013 by FirePiston because: (no reason given)

Wow, you must have a very old system then. Here are the minimum system requirements to play Eve Online:

CPU that supports SSE2
GPU
with 256 MB VRAM or more
that supports Shader Model 3
that supports DirectX 9.0c
Drivers: DirectX 9.0c (included)
Audio
that supports SSE
that is Direct Sound compatible
HD: 20 GB free space (or more)
Network: ADSL connection (or faster)

Any CPU made after 2001 will support SSE2.

DirectX 9.0c has been around for a very, very long time now.

Video cards with at least 256MB of ram and can handle Shader Model 3 have been around for many years now too. However, Eve used to require Shader Model 2.0, but they changed that back in 2010 or 2011 I believe. They (CCP) polled their users and asked, many laptop users didn't want them to upgrade, but CCP wanted to make Eve look even better, so they compromised and told users that they would have a year to upgrade as they needed to beable to compete with newer games that do use Shader Model 3.0

NowanKenubi
I played for a year and am currently on a break, but I can give you one sound advice you should always follow; never, ever, fly with 100s of PLEX.

I've seen or heard about a couple of guys that got destroyed, and they were flying with that, or with billions worth of blueprint... lol

That was you??? oops...sorry!

Just kidding. Being a griefer or pirate is just an aspect of Eve I've never really wanted to play, so I don't suicide gank anyone.

Aweome game, I have started playing about 2 months ago.

Currently flying an Exhumer with strip miners waiting for my battleship skills to go up. Going to buy a Myrmidon then.

reply to post by Biigs


War dec???? (gives high pitched scream, takes POS down, quits player corp).




nah....actually I'll meet you outside the station in my PVP Drake, or Hurricane, or even just a Caracal and try to give you a gf. Loosing ships is no big deal (weeeelllllllll......okay, making stupid mistakes and loosing a CNR or Tengu.....yah, that does hurt a bit, but mostly my pride, hehehehehe), and hiding in the station during a War Dec is BOOOOOORRRRIIIINGGGG!

Biggs is right though, take a long time to train up to certain ships and equipment. You CAN buy a character that someone else has trained up (ain't cheap, and will cost you billions of ISK). But......even if you have a character that has 50 million skill points, if you don't have the experience of actually playing, you're going to loose ships and implants a LOT. You have to learn how to play and how to use things in game.

Of course, there are a LOT of friendly people (even the evil gankers (HISSSS BOOOOO!)). who will show you the ropes and help you out. Even if a person kills you, don't get mad and start screaming at them in Local. Instead, admit your mistake (if you got ganked) or tell them "gf" (meaning Good Fight), and then ASK them questions, they'll be more than happy to tell you how to do things (especially if you just got ganked by them, and they now have 2 billion ISK from your cargo you had, hehehehehe).

reply to post by eriktheawful


I quit the corp I was in because they were very aggressive and we were ending up in wardecs every weeks...

I'm a good guy, so I don't suicide gank.

I even stood up to what'sisname that bumps every miners away from belts, unless you pay a huge amount to them. My corp and alliance didn't like that, that I stood up.

I wish we could have "sheriffs'" badges, like the criminals have a tag pointing to them... lol

NowanKenubi
reply to post by eriktheawful

 

I quit the corp I was in because they were very aggressive and we were ending up in wardecs every weeks...

I'm a good guy, so I don't suicide gank.

I even stood up to what'sisname that bumps every miners away from belts, unless you pay a huge amount to them. My corp and alliance didn't like that, that I stood up.

I wish we could have "sheriffs'" badges, like the criminals have a tag pointing to them... lol

That's why I hang out in Amarr space mostly. It's HUGE, lots of areas with very little players in it, so you don't get mission crashers, nija salvagers, or gankers messing with miners. The place I'm in right now has all of 7 people in Local, and lots of roids to mine. Then next door is a level 4 security agent I mission grind with, only about 20 people in local there. I make about 800 million a week doing that.

Up in Caldari space though, whew! Crowded (lots of Russian people there I've noticed), hard to find a good spot to mine or mission run in.

The other reason I like Amarr space is the low sec area is much,much bigger, and so the populations are lower, makes it much easier to jump in my Tengu, cloaked and go ratting. Most other low sec areas, especially Caldari space, is Gate Campers Paradise.

I started as a Galente pilot, but I then discovered Caldari ships and their then lovable missiles.

I trained my Galente to pilot Caldari ship, and created another character, this time pure Caldari. Then the latest update arrived, and my beautiful Drake wasn't that hot or effective anymore. I could do a few level 4 missions in it, but after the update, I could barely make level 3s...

And yes, Caldari space is full of Russians! lol

In both spaces I had spots where I mined everyday, being mostly alone.

But if there is more place in Amarr, maybe I should think about going there?

I'll need to reactivate my characters, then...

NowanKenubi
I started as a Galente pilot, but I then discovered Caldari ships and their then lovable missiles.

I trained my Galente to pilot Caldari ship, and created another character, this time pure Caldari. Then the latest update arrived, and my beautiful Drake wasn't that hot or effective anymore. I could do a few level 4 missions in it, but after the update, I could barely make level 3s...

And yes, Caldari space is full of Russians! lol

In both spaces I had spots where I mined everyday, being mostly alone.

But if there is more place in Amarr, maybe I should think about going there?

I'll need to reactivate my characters, then...

edit on 11-11-2013 by NowanKenubi because: (no reason given)

Hey I'm Gallante too! And I also use Caldari ships!

They nerfed the Drake? I didn't notice. I mean they added a new Drake (Navy Drake) to the game with the Oddessey expansion.

I mostly use my CNR (Caldari Navy Raven) for level 4 mission grinding (with T2 missiles), but you can do them just fine in a regular Raven too as long as your skills are trained up to tank with shields (use a perma shield booster) and get your Cruise missiles trained up.

I trained up on Mimatar ships so I could use the guns they use. When I get bored, I run level 3 missions in a Hurricane or run some level 4 missions in my Maelstrom using 1200mm artys.

I'll have to go see what they did to the Drake. I've not used it in a while, and mostly use my T3 Tengu for level 3s or ratting sites.

Oh! Yah, they nerfed the Heavy Missiles is what they did (5% reduction in damage and 35% reduction in range).

I heard they did that because the Drakes and Tengus had become way too poweful in their (the Devs) opinion.

But I also heard that they buffed the HAMs (Heavy Assault Missles) some. Since I use the Cruise missiles, I didn't notice it too much (I normally close range when in a Drake or Tengu, especially since my Tengu moves at over 625 m/s).

reply to post by eriktheawful


The loss of range was a real kick in the pants for me. I was flying it like a champ for a month when the "update" arrived.

A Navy Drake, you say? lol I didn't know... I've taken a break a couples of month ago.


But now... I... I feel the a-diction coming back... lol

I had a CNR, I may still have it, I don't remember... but I wasn't quite at ease with it for some reason. I forget which one I had more fun with, aside from the Drake...

hmm... what to do, what to do...

If anyone needs some help fitting any combat ships, send me a PM. Been pvping for very long time now.

I fly all non capital combat ships and my knowledge weapon systems and modules is pretty extensive, most of the time i dont even use EFT

reply to post by Biigs


hehe Not long after I began playing EVE, I hurt my head and got a bad concussion. For me, all things fitting are like a big bowl of fogginess. lol

I had trouble with it, and it's probably worse after a few months off...

When I'll get back in the game, you will get a call from me...

Gah, this has proper whetted (wetted? meh) my appetite and i'm feeling way under sci-fi'd.

Downloading the client for a trial as we speak. Totally can't remember the bizarre spelling of my old character and god knows what e-mail i was using... plus i was a Caldari and missiles sound nerfed. That and i dont speak Russian.

We'll see if my abacus can still run the game later this evening.

reply to post by skalla


They just nerfed the Heavy Missiles. They didn't touch the Light, HAMs or Cruise missles.

It was because of how powerful the Drake was: Tanks like a BS, and was able to do almost as much damage, plus a insane amount of range if you trained up enough, from what I understand.

Not that I agreed with it, (Pppppppppth! to CCP).

But they are introducing some cool stuff this Nov. 19th with the Rubicon expansion:

They are buffing warping out (making things go to warp faster when aligned).
They are adding two new ships from the Sisters Of Eve, ideal for exploring and working sites and WH space.
They are introducing some player stuctures, some that can even be deployed in hi sec.
And a few other things (like a new super rare anom called Ghost Sites, found everywhere in Eve that look very interesting).