EVE Online

Being a scientist in EVE Online

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

A large part of EVE Online is the player driven economy. Nearly everything can be crafted by players and then sold. To create items all you need is the materials and a blueprint. The blueprints are where the scientists come in. Just to clarify, when I say scientists I mean R&D people. R&D involves “working” with an NPC agent to produce Tech-2 blueprints. The way it’s implemented isn’t ideal but it certainly makes the Tech-2 blueprints rare.

Basically once you start R&D with an agent you accumulate research points. Blueprints are awarded to players randomly in a lottery based on the number of research points you have. The better the agent, the more research points you accumulate. This means that while you’re waiting to train the skills it’s a good idea to do normal agent missions to increase your standing with the NPC’s corp. Unfortunately the requirements are quite high. You need Science level 5 as well as specific science skill for the agent you want to work with (Quantum Physics for instance). Unfortunately every scientific skill requires another skill at level 5 (Electronics, Engineering, Mechanics for instance). And if you want to operate more than one agent you need Research Project Management which of course has it’s own requirements. You can make your life easier by training your relevant learning skills to level 5 first. These are Learning (+2% to all attributes per level), Analytical Mind (+1 Intelligence per level) and Instant Recall (+1 Memory per level). Higher attributes make skills train faster.

If you really want to go all the way (and have the ISK spare) each attribute has a second learning skill that does exactly the same thing, but takes longer to train and requires the previous skill at level 5 first (Eidetic Memory for instance). Since I don’t have all of these I cant’ give you any more info yet. But stay tuned.

An EVE Signup

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

Hurrah! Someone signed up to EVE Online following an affiliate link from my site (like the banner above if you’re reading this on the actual post page).

Seems like a perfect opportunity to encourage more. EVE Online is a persistent universe MMORPG. This means it’s a multiplayer game played over the Internet with thousands of other people. Since “thousands” is vague, I’ll be more specific. There are over 100,000 players subscribed as well as many other free accounts. When I go on (about 18:00 GMT) there are between 15,000 and 20,000 logged on.

As you can hopefully tell from the banners (again if you’re reading from the actual post page) it’s space-based sci-fi. Sort of like a modern day Elite. You can trade, fight, research, manufacture and lots of other cool things. Nearly everything in the game is player crafted (and is at least able to be player crafted) and it’s even possible to build stations and official control systems. If that sounds like fun then sign up for a free trial account now :)

Don’t get cocky in EVE Online

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

I’ve been playing EVE for a few weeks now. I ventured into low sec (0.3, 0.4) space a couple of times and killed some NPC pirates. So I got arrogant and decided to hang around to mine some better ores. I’ve since lost two ships (well four technically - one of them was a freighter with two shuttles) to player pirates and moved back to safer space. Although I didn’t lose my escape pod during either attack.

EVE Online and Pimsleur

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

Pimsleur makes the perfect companion to EVE Online, especially when you’re doing cargo runs or other things that don’t meed much concentration. Why not learn Spanish nipping out to buy that new Battleship? :P

I’m not sure if you can alter the in game music that EVE uses (and changing it to Pimsleur would probably be a hassle since you’re only going to play each track once) but you can run EVE in a window and therefore use whatever media player you like in the background.

EVE, EVE Online, Spanish, Pimsleur

New player corp in EVE Online

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

Okay, it’s a dangerous thing to do and of dubious use, but boy do you get loads of buttons to press, I am now the CEO of a 2-man corporation in EVE. In slightly dodgy space no less. But between us (that would be me and the other guy) our capability to defend ourselves is ever increasing.

One thing I’ve noticed is an apparent lack of information regarding running a corporation. Most of it I can work out, but what the hell is gold for instance? If anyone could point me at a guide I’d be much a appreciative.

Making money as an arms dealer

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

After picking up a cheap blueprint (a DRMed copy of course) I am now an arms manufacturer and dealer in EVE Online.

I read that making money from selling self-manufactured items was difficult without Production Efficiency skill of 5 and I’m managing with 3. Although I’m not buying all the raw materials though. I buy the Tritanium which I needs loads of and mine the Nocxium myself. I think if I had to pay for the Nocxium then I’d be screwed…

And remember to get your free 14 day EVE Online trial.

DRM is everywhere - even in EVE

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

Considering the attention that Digital Rights Management is getting these days I found it funny that DRM is actually present within EVE Online.

To build things in EVE you use blueprints. There are originals which can make any number of items and copies which are licensed and only make a certain amount. Certain blueprints are very rare and this way the players controlling them can keep them rare.

EVE Online theme

Oliver Brown
— This upcoming video may not be available to view yet.

Since I joined the EVE Online affiliate scheme I figured I’d create one of my mini-themes for EVE. It has to be my favourite so far :D

The important part of the theme is the flash banner (it only appears on the actual post pages). Clicking this takes you to a free 14 day trial so you can try EVE out. Warning, it can become addictive very quickly!

EVE, EVE Online, MMORPG