Im new player in EVE Online.
I want to start Exploration activities (pvp in the future), just wanna know which skills should I train first (there is any skillplan for explorers)? Which ship for begginner will be okay and not too expensive? Any good fits?.
I know… many stupid questions, but it seems like EVE is huge game and knowledge is precious. I found some info on other sites, but I want to know it from YOU - experienced EVE Citizens.
Greetings.
Don’t be too strict to me.
Hello fellow Imperial.
First off, are you going to be subscribing or playing for free? I ask because, as best I can recall, the F2P players do not get access to cloaking devices. They can still explore but they have to put in some extra work to mitigate risks while out exploring.
Anyway, you’re going to want to train the scanning skills. There aren’t that many, but they open up a lot of content in the game. Skills like Astrometrics and Astrometric Rangefinding increase the strength of your probes (the amount of signal they gain with each scan, essentially). Astrometric Pinpointing helps speed up scanning by reducing the amount of deviation (the distance a potential hit is from the actual location of the site). Astrometric Acquisition is probably the least important, although training it does reduce the duration of the scan. When you’re out exploring, faster is better.
You’ll need to train Archaeology if you want to access loot in Relic sites and Hacking if you want to access loot in Data sites.
As I said earlier, faster is better. So you’ll want to train skills in the Navigation tree to make your ship more maneuverable.
If you’re subscribing, Cloaking is a nice skill to have.
Lastly, there’s the Ship Command skills. Some ships have bonuses for scanning, and your level of Ship Command skill (ex: Caldari Frigate for the Heron) can improve your scanning performance.
You could train up some defensive skills, but if you’ve gotten yourself caught in a flimsy scanning frigate you’re a dead pilot flying.
The rest is all down to your knowledge of game mechanics. A decent beginner scanning ship that can handle most easy/intermediate sites will costs you 2-3 mil. One good site can make back your investment (possible many times over), but of course exploration is all about dat RNG. You can scan in hisec to be safe, but you’ll be competing with other rookies doing the same, so you’d benefit by learning to use the map filters. Heatmaps for statistics like “jumps in the last hour” help you to find less-traveled pockets of hisec, out of the way of the normal routes, where sites might accumulate.
Otherwise, you could try scanning down wormholes in hisec systems. There is of course some risk here, but again, your investment is 2-3 mil for potentially far more than that in reward. Of particular note are wormholes of class C1-C3 (there are tools you can use to identify class by system name), because in these wormholes you can find the same kind of pirate faction (Angel/Blood Raider/Guristas/Sansha/Serpentis) data and relic sites as can be found way out in nullsec. There are wormhole sites that have dangerous hostile NPCs, but these pirate faction sites do NOT. When I was exploring, there were days when I’d jump into a WH from an out-of-the-way hisec system and find a site worth 20-80 mil one or two wormholes in.
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Come over here and sit on Fluffah’s lap. Mmmmm… now dat’s good boy. Weel geiv you sum tips 'ere.
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Okay… so…
you can consider most frigates as “beginner ships” in a sense. They are relatively cheap compared to everything else in the game (thus making them fairly disposable) and different frigates cover different specialties that you can dabble in (provided you train the appropriate skills and fits to use them effectively).
Your best bet is to start working on “core skills.” These are skills that affect all ships and enhance your ability fit and use them. You can find all of the relevant “core skills” in the Engineering Tab on your character sheet.
Mix in some “fun” skills as well. Skills to pilot ships, weapons to slap on said ships, propulsion modules, Electronic Warfare modules, etc.
Understand that there is no one ship or fit that will be optimal for “everything.” Using and fitting ships is more situational and so you will often find yourself tinkering with your fit (even after several years of playing).
Dabble in this or that and ask for help from older, more experienced players. They can help you find optimal ships and fits for different situations.
Keep in mind that you are LEARNING. Besides accumulating knowledge, gaining experience should also be a “must.” And you can only gain experience in something by trying (even if you are unsure and/or know you are going to fail).
Thanks for these fast and extensive answers! I’d love this community.
Since you started Amarr, you’re probably going to find yourself using the Amarr Magnate exploration frigate at the start of your scanning career. It’s got the fewest mid-slots of the bunch (compared to the Caldari Heron, Gallente Imicus and Minmatar Probe) so your options for extra doodads is a bit restricted. Personally I find it entirely apt to the task, but some prefer extra gadgets like modules that improve scanning performance or cargo scanners for inspecting the contents of a hacked can so you can cherrypick loot at a site. If you find it too restrictive, you can just train into the frigates of the other races.
The Exploration - Advanced fit on that page I linked is pretty good. If your skills do not allow you to fit some of those items you can try fitting the weaker T1 variants. Since the cans at a site can be very far apart (and speed is key), you’ll definitely want that microwarpdrive to get around the site quickly.
All of the other information and replies here are spot on. I particularly agree with @ShahFluffers comment about training core skills as a priority and adding others in to mix things up.
For additional information, here is a great article that covers a lot of general info about exploration, including specific skills and what they do, the different kinds of sites, and general techniques:
https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Exploration
Also, UniWiki is an amazing resource for a new player- it has very extensive documentation on almost everything in EVE.
Good luck, and welcome to EVE!
Exploration can be a fun solo thing to do. I love hitting data and relic sites.
There is a second thing you can do with your scan frig(Amarr Magnate, Caldari Heron, Gallente Imicus, and Minmatar Probe) and scanning skills. You can also scan down lost drones and grab them. If the owner warped out and left them in space,free to grab.
Every now and then when I’m not doing anything important, I’ll do a scan with combat probes(can see ships, drones, and other man made thing in space). Sometimes I find nice expensive thing to grab up.
You could use combat scan probes to find lost drones, yes.
But you can also use them to find other players and their pinatas (mobile tractor units). If you want to be a bad guy, you can salvage the wrecks created by other players after scanning them down in a combat site.
Like I said, scanning opens up the game quite a bit.
It’s funny that for a famously “toxic” playerbase, all anyone ever really has to do is be polite and willing to learn to avoid 99% of the flack.
Welcome to EvE 
Quoted for emphasis.
To any and all newbies looking at this thread; if you come away with only one thing from this thread, make sure that this is it.
The community here WILL help you.
Whether you stumble or fall, blow up in flaming glory or with an anonymous whimper… you need only ask “HOW DID THIS HAPPEN??” and show a willingness to learn.
Sure, we may tease you a bit and talk a fair amount of trash while we are helping, but as long as people show a willingness to LEARN and move past their “owie” they will get all the support they could ever want.
Some people may even recruit newbies on this basis.
Hello and welcome to Eve.
May you have a long and rewarding career here.
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