I haven’t played the game in about 4-5 years and can’t remember squat about it. What I mainly remember is that before I left I gave EVERYTHING away. All ships, fittings, etc. So what I’m left with now is 6m ISK that I sent over from my secondary account. What I’m looking for is a good ship build to use for starting over again that when fitted will cost 6m or less. I was looking at the Merlin again but figured things have changed and it would be better to ask than jump into mistakes. Any advice is appreciated and ty in advance.
A lot depends on what you want to do in the game. The Merlin is an excellent choice for running level 1 missions but a Venture will be a better choice for mining - you can get both ships free along with enough cash to fit them by running the career missions (there are 3 sets of career missions for each empire faction) https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Career_Agents
After that, the SOE Epic Arc will provide enough cash to buy and fit a Cruiser https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/The_Blood-Stained_Stars
at that point you should have a better idea what you want to do in the game and start looking for a corporation that supports that playstyle.
Some basic info and fits for the Merlin: https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Merlin
Goof luck.
Thanks for the response. I did all of the tutorials way back when. I don’t believe I did the SOE Epic Arc though so I’ll look into that.
As far as what I plan to do, I like mining and mission running. I can’t afford a good miner yet so that’s why I was thinking about the Merlin to start level 1 missions. Just the thought of it makes me miss my old decked out Naga that I used to have.
remember you can make a lot of money comparatively to missions/mining by exploring wh and opening cans . Just don’t do that from wh around tradehubs, they are camped.
Also you will most likely lose your fist 10 herons so don’t fit them expensively.
If your goal is to PvE, then just aim for the current meta. Can’t go wrong with it. The meta ships also happen to be useful across widest variety of situations and their skills required will enable you to fly some decent PvP ships / fits on the side with little skill additions.
By the time you finish, then you can focus on what content you wanna do in the game and focus your training and you will have enough experience to not have to come and ask.
The best all-around general PvE ship is the Gila. It can do L4s with ease, it is the meta for Abyss, it can run DEDs, you’ll need a t1 scan frig with some scanning skills and scan down sites 1st and you can now save bookmarks straight from your probe window, then run them in the Gila. It can do some (but very few) team burners. its drawback is trainign time. you will need level 4-5 (mostly 5s) skills for it and it uses Gallente and Caldari cruiser, so double there.
The cheapest all around PvE ship is Vexor Navy Issue. It can do some L4s if you go armor fit (about half), not the shihty 100mn shield fit that you will find plastered everywhere, actually, it will do more then half L4s but you have to pick the ones that tailor the NPC damagae type to its natural resits. If you fit it too much to plug holes then you drop DPS too much and then you can do a lot less in it. Lower skill reqs then Gila, and kinda “on the way” to training in Gila. It can crank L3 and equivalent content all day long without sweat.
In general, the meta is missiles, Drones and Shield Tank. HAMs or Cruise, though sometimes RLHMs (like Gila secondary) or HMs (like some of the C3 fits missle boats) are used.
If you want to save training time on drones then skip light and sentry drones. Go for medium and heavy, specialize in them, most of all in Gallente and Caldari. The other ones have situational uses where the 1st 2 are only slightly sub par and you can do just fine without them. Small targets such asfrigs etc, just kill with medium drones and a drone tracking module or one sort or anotehr (or 2 modules if no hull bonus). Use heavies on battleship sized targets.
Missle training, focus mainly on HAMs, Rapid Light Missle Launchers as secondary for Gila if you end up running Abyss and see yourself progressing in it and doing it a lot, you’ll need it.
Battleships. Don’t jump straight for battleships, you’ll waste a ton oftrainign time by doing so while actually limiting the amount of content you can do in them. Can’t do Abyss as well as a lot of sites that do not allow battleships through the gates. their main advantage is that you can run the really tough L4 content such as epic arcs, some L5s even without having to dual box or play in pair with someone. However, as I said, all regular L4s can be done in a Gila, and in addition, you can’t take a battleship into a lot of places, or even if you can a cruiser is a ton better due to battleships clunkiness and slowness.
if you do end up going for battleships, train up Caldari, then Gallente, go Raven Navy, Scorpion Navy, then Rattlesnake. Cruise missles + Micro Jump Drive + MWD is a very good combo, or you can go Heavy Rapid Missle Launchers for shorter range but more punch and better application. I have both but prefer the double prop cruise.
Side train into a Tengu from Caldari, if you wanna do some explo stuff on the side while training your PvE meta. Its not the best, Loki is better and Legion in some WHs is better, but you’ll already have the shield and missle skills necessary for it so it will take you less time.
stop using “meta” when you have no idea what this word means. You use it like a paradigm ( https://i1.wp.com/www.cs.berkeley.edu/~kubitron/images/dilbert-paradigm.jpg )
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Thanks for the info @Fluffy_Moe. I don’t have the ISK to get that far into it yet and I’ve come across a bind as it is. I got the Merlin and started fitting it and I’m stuck atm with charges.
I used the Uniwiki Merlin build from the link that @Do_Little gave for the Magic Merlin and bought what I could afford/use based on training. I’ve had a fully equipped Merlin before I left so I’ve learned the stuff to fit one really well. But now I can’t figure out why I can’t equip the charges. I had to go with the Light Neutron Blaster I instead of the II’s because I don’t have the training. So I equipped the blasters and bought the charges but it’s not letting me equip the charges because I don’t have training for Small Hybrid Turret V. I can’t put it in my skill queue either because I’m beyond the 5m Clone State Alpha Training Limit, which is all new to me. There was no limit before when I played. I’m currently at about 10m SP and can’t afford to buy any Skill Injectors to increase my limit so I’m stuck on what to do. Did they bump up the requirement to use charges as well and is there a way to get around this that I don’t know?
Sorry for sounding so noob but I’m really lost as to how the hell I have 10m SP and can no longer fit a basic Merlin with low level equipment.
I have never really understood what “meta” is supposed to mean.
This I can understand, but what makes it “meta”?
Sounds like you’re trying to put Tech II charges in a Tech I launcher. No good. Use Tech I or Faction charges.
If you’re already at the 5M SP max for alpha clones, you’re stuck as far as training goes until either you go omega or you can afford to buy skill injectors.
Some good information here: Clone states - EVE University Wiki and here: Turrets - EVE University Wiki
@Corwin_Dnari Thanks for the tip on the charges. I bought some faction charges and it let me equip them so now I can use my Merlin. And thanks for posting the link for the Alpha Clone article. It was a good quick read so I have a better understanding of what to expect until I can earn some Plex.
Glad I could help. Fly safe. 
I know you mean this as helpful advice but come on. Gilas are indeed proficient at a wide range of content but they are so ■■■■■■■ boring to fly. I know “interesting” and “PvE” aren’t often associated, but I find I can at least have fun with it, but only if I’m not in a Gila or a Domi (or presumably a Rattlesnake, though I’ve never had the displeasure).
OP, if you choose to train for a Gila, great. Just know that there are more engaging ways to play the damn game.
Your Merlin should get you most of the way through the SOE Epic arc and more than enough ISK to buy and fit a cruiser for the last few missions. At your current stage in the game, it’s worth looting the wrecks - you’ll collect a fair bit of ammo and some useful modules.
Meta gaming is extending the game beyond the core mechanics. Some will argue that Eve is mostly politics and economics - complex player driven activity, not content put in the game by the developers for us to consume.
“meta X” means "a X of X ". In competitive games, many options can counter other options. Selecting your options to give you an advantage in game is the meta game.
According to the choice you make AND the choices the opponent makes your selection of ships / tactics can be more or less effective. The composition of ships and fits heavily used are what is defined as “meta game”. A healthy meta game should have a wide choice of available viable options, typically if a composition is much more efficient than others and needs to be specifically countered if a team chooses another composition it creates imbalance(X is imba) and requires nerf.
In lower-competitive games like Eve (where competition is not fair) it becomes harder to balance things out (because you can’t balance against sheer number). So competition events (like AT) are important to keep the game in a healthy state.
However this is completely unrelated to the topic at hand. Without a reliable metric of usage talking about meta in this context is blowing in the wind. And people on Eve are not always willingly giving their good recipe, because once it’s shared the benefit is lost for the one who took the time to figure it out.
Not exclusive to Eve Online but gaming in general.
There are multiple reasons why it is what it is. Low to no cap use freeing up fitting options, better DPS application in a lot of cases, flexible DPS available all damage types, often options for different ranges, accuracy, application, speed ( in case of drones) available by simply switching ammo or drone type instead of switching entire ship or fit.
Shield tank in general is better for PvE then armor tank, but not in all cases obviously. In addition, with shields you often have an option of making a passive regen fit, which armor does not have.
So it isn’t that they are best at everything, but rather that they are eitehr good, or OK at everything, while the otehr ships will perform better in a single situation but will fall far behind in others where the missle/drone/shield ships still perform relatively decent. This simply translates to being able to do more content, with same ship / fit, which is just flat out less boring over long term then otherwise.
Eventually, you will have every ship and fit type, so you will see. It is just a matter of what you want to do 1st.
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