First of all, where can you learn to know more about the universe of EVE? There are several places, and I will list all I know of, below;
Lore Resources List
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EVE Universe and
Backstory section.Eve Universe is a modernized and vastly expanded version of the old Backstory website, which originally housed all of the game’s lore. The link is included here for posterity’s sake, as the old site has apparently been made inaccessible.
Eve Universe is a fiction portal that houses in-universe news, chronicles, empire and faction introductions, and contains an encyclopedia of the game’s lore, all of which is fully searchable. It is the most recent and up-to-date source of EVE’s lore, maintained by CCP themselves. -
EVE RP Lore Wiki, a backup copy of a previous incarnation of the fiction portal, which contains hundreds if not thousands of lore related articles and volumes and then volumes of text, mostly written by CCP or their ISD Volunteers. It is encyclopedic in nature - being originally a Wiki - and as such usable for fact checking and wiki binging.
It is good to keep in mind tough that some of the information in this Wiki can be severely outdated, and that some parts of it are player created, so it doesn’t hurt to consult other players if something you found here is still valid. Likely it is valid, but anything pertaining to the game itself isn’t immune to change, and there is the ever present possibility of some retcons happening, or in a more positive note, more in-depth takes on the subjects in newer fiction source releases. -
Mark726’s EVE Lore Survival Guide, as the name implies is written like a book, and is in a way more entertaining read than those above, covering all the basics and then some. It uses mainly the former Evelopedia - now preserved in part as the above mentioned copy - as its sources as well as books from the EVE Universe. In my understanding it is a primer for new roleplayers, but it is a fantastic read for anyone interested in the universe of EVE.
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EVE: Source, The Frigates of EVE, and prose. (Links lead to Amazon, since CCP itself uses Amazon in their dev blogs when advertising their books).
Traditional books that contain stories and illustrations from the world of EVE. Most, if not all information in EVE: Source and Frigates of EVE have been updated to the Eve Universe site. -
In-universe news. Last but not least, the World News contain huge swathes of lore easily missed by many, not least notable of which is establishing dates for certain events like Caldari State Workers Union Day or Liberation Day. They can often also contain information not found elsewhere, offering even more insight to the day-to-day affairs of the people living in New Eden.
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DATA EXPUNGED
An interactive timeline of the events in the history of the star cluster of New Eden - A very comprehensive list of what happened and when in the background story of EVE. Regularly updated by @darkezero.(Sadly, this site was shut down at the end of 2020.)
Player compiled lore repositories, on specific topics
Feel free to add your own favourite sources and specific lore compendiums below, I’ll add them to this post when/if possible.
Player compiled information dumps:
Lore Primers
- EVE Lore Primer from CrossingZebras - What it says on the tin.
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to New Eden - Backstory of the main empires in IC perspective
Amarr lore compilations
- Praetorian Temple Library - Compendium of Amarr Lore
Caldari Lore compilations
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Collection of links about Caldari lore. How appropriate, it’s a spreadsheet.
Gallente / Intaki / Syndicate lore compilations
- Intaki Lore Archive - Compendium of Intaki Lore
- Roleplaying Gallente Federation? Start here - Reloaded - help for roleplaying Gallente.
Minmatar lore compilations
- So you want to roleplay… a Minmatar?
- Map of Matar, the Minmatar home planet, by @Ferra_Orta .
- Vherokior Tribe - collection of various and scattered lore about the Vherokior Tribe
- Minmatar Lore Project - A huge collection of various news, in-game items and other resourses about Minmatar.
Pirate lore compilations
Ancient / Unplayable races lore compilations
Miscellanous compilations
FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions
FAQ: Frequently Asked Question about EVE Lore.
Do note that I am not an infallible source of information, I’ve tried to fact check everything here, but if I’m wrong, people are free to and should correct me. I’m trying to answer more general questions, not ones tied to specific factions or such.
Q#1: Wow, that’s a lot of stuff, where do I even start?
A: Is there anything you’ve ever wanted to know about some faction, perhaps? How Stargates work? My advice is to think of something that has bugged you about EVE’s backstory, looking it up from the sources mentioned above, and then continue on from there.
Q#2: How are Capsuleers “made?” How does one become a capsuleer?
A: This is a primer about capsuleer training for those who want to roleplay in EVE - this is how your character came to be whoever she or he is today, if they became a capsuleer in the old-fashioned way. It’s quite a demanding process that can take up to a decade to achieve!
Alpha clones, which have been around since late YC118 (2016) are built differently, and to my understanding can bypass most if not all of that rigorous training the older capsuleers had to go through - though the need for genetic compatibility still applies.
Back in my day, we had to ski to capsuleer school, uphill, both ways…!
Thanks to Samira Kernher for suggesting this.
Q#3: How much is ISK worth for a normal person or on a planet?
A: That is a surprisingly difficult question. Despite it being quite central to us as players, most of the lore regarding it is very fragmented and not always internally consistent. Depending on who you ask and the context, ISK can be worth a lot, or next to nothing. According to the Stairway To Heaven -chronicle, planetary and space economies are largely separated, so on many planets, ISK would hold little to no value. In space however, ISK reigns as king. In the chronicle Khadrea it is compared to “Amamake credits” (apparently a systemwide currency), where millions of credits are worth a paltry few thousand ISK and chump change.
Generally, ISK (InterStellar Kredit) is regarded as an interstellar trade currency, and specifically one used almost entirely in space by capsuleers and large, interstellar scale corporations to represent sums that would be inconveniently big if expressed in other currencies.
Q#4: Do our ships have crews?
A: Yes. There are ship crew guidelines established by CCP. Note: Capsuleer piloted frigates have since been established to be flown by capsuleers only. The guideline also ignores various industrial ships, and as titled, are more of a guideline than anything concrete. Technology in-universe has marched on for ten years since that guideline was written.
Q#5: I heard somewhere the Empires have these huge Titans, what are they? Why can’t we fly them?
A: These are called Iapetan Titans (note that it is written with a capital I, not L. ), or “First Generation Titans”.
They are fairly few in number because building just two generally means cannibalizing an entire suitable moon for raw materials. As such, they are large enough to generate their own gravity and are not allowed near inhabited planets because their gravity can cause, among other things, tidal disruption. So, yeah. We can’t fly them because capsuleers are jerks who would cause ecological disasters just for laughs.
Exact numbers are military secrets, but all empires are assumed to operate at least a handful of Iapetan Titans.
Q#6: Why aren’t there any aliens EVE?
A: Several species on planets are alien species, including but not limited to to the Slaver Hound, The Hanging Long-Limb, Fedo, Shiksi and Corovid to name a few. There just are no sapient aliens - that we know of - in EVE universe.
Q#7: Hey, I got this really cool idea about all this lore stuff, how can I tell CCP about it?
A: CCP has a volunteer system in place, one department - New Eden Correspondents - focuses mainly on lore. You can try applying there. Alternatively, you can just post your ideas on this forum section, and of course, the “Player Features & Ideas” subforum.
Q#8: This is all beyond cool, but I want to know who writes all this stuff for us?
A: Generally, various CCP Devs and members of the ISD. Pilot @Kolmogorow has compiled a handy list to answer this.
Q#9: I’ve noticed planets, stars, stargates etc. have wonky stats from real life physics standpoint, what gives?
A: Because there are over 5,000 solar systems in New Eden, various values for the solar systems are randomly generated, and whoever was in charge of generating them forgot to specify realistic limits for many values. Fun bit of trivia; the universe seed for EVE is “42.”.
Feel free to add your own topics, favourite links and ask whatever you want, make corrections and so on, I’ll be here, updating stuff when I can.
