Personally myself I don’t think a new player under 6 months should be flying a Battleship, unless they’ve trained up all the necessary Core Fitting Skills to fly it effectively.
Anyway, a Praxis Battleship is easily accessible for new players. It basically has the same stats as a Gnosis but with a 7/7/7 slot lay-out and an even larger Drone Bay.
I found a guy who was back in november, only 6 months into the game, and barely could fly a drake. so we worked with him on his skills and taught him the basics on the drake, while he worked on getting into a raven. sadly, he is down with goons, but he is having fun, which is all that matters.
Sunesis makes a very good small cargo transport if you’re a new upcoming trader newbie.You can fit it with hyperspatials rigs and inertia stabs and voila perfect low volume module hauler
Here is an link to a thread discussing the VNI 100MN Shield Vexor Navy Issue, the workhorse of 0.0 ratting That helped me look at the VNI Hope it helps anothe newbie out
Definitely the Drake for me, such an forgiving ship. Passive shield tank allows you to not worry about tank really and get the hang of things an so make isk. Then when your more experience and want to develop you can then go onto active tank ships.
Plus everyone’s loves the drake fleets 
I only flew the drake after I flew the GIla and for me a drake is slow in killing and just does not have the tank a gila has, or have I got the drake fit/skills wrong ?
Let me know
Drakes really easy and yeah it’s not the greatest ship at clearing missions but with the mobile deport next to you, you can swap shield power relays out for more ballistic control units if needed…
missiles in highs
Shield passive tank in mods maybe an AB.
Shield power relays and Ballistics in lows
Rigs are normally purgers
Girls is a lovely ship tho
When i started 7 years ago, LadyofWrath was trying his best to get me into a drake that way i could make some decent isk. While I loved the drake, even though they nerfed it during the time i disappeared and came back, I been fighting to get into my raven that i’m in now… but I still have a drake for when I help in lower levels.
Yea everyone had a drake back then ^^
This is fun discussing the cruisers in the game, now let me ask an very important question what frigate is the best to learn this pointing business in, for a starter player I would like something cheap that I can loose a lot of em, Honestly learning the warp scram/webify is going to be fun but I think a little bit expensive so far if I see a neutral I just run away I want to start shooting back,
You should better ask this in the PvP section. You are now only throwing even more things all into the same thread.
Gnosis is a good starter for new players. Maybe we should make some base T1 fits for them and post them here. Its a ship to fly while they train at least to be somewhat effective in whatever line of ships they picked. regardless if its a VNI, Caracal, or whatever else, Gnosis is a good stepping stone towards that.
For Amarran, Caldari, and Gallente pilots sure. I could post up a few fits fast enough if needed. Minmatar however should just stick to their own ships and not use the Gnosis unless they are planning on shifting to a drone focus. Their own ships are far better bonused for projectile weapons, because straight damage doesn’t do nearly as much good for them as fire rate and fall-off for that weapon system in a PvE setting.
Under 6 months huh?
When three months in, someone give me an advise to search “mjd sniper sentry rattlesnake” and buy everything T1 to start doing lv4 missions in SoE Apanake (no gurista npc that can reach mjd range). Im being able to plex my account from running mission since then by doing it.
Best advise ever for me.
MJD RS has lower skill points needed compared to Brawling RS to be used decently. The MJDRS is the best choise for newbro. You must go omega though.
RS itself is used widely in PVE. Highsec mission running, null ratting, RR C6 WH. You wont waste the skills to train her up.
Thanks Kasandra! I fall into your “new player” category. I’m only a few days old. Got bored playing Elite Dangerous and wanted to try something new. I’m doing the tutorial missions, but have no clue what ship to focus on. I think if I went Gila or VNI, it might help me to be productive in a corporation, make some money to save for ship replacement, and meet some other players in the game.
The only thing i know of EvE is what I would read or see on youtube. The large space battles, and fun people seem to have. Now that I’m here, I’m struggling to make the right ship choice and not waste the skill points alloted me. Id love the larger ships at some point, but it seems like that will be a long time coming with the skill learning times. Just a new person perspective.
not quite a new player and not quite a “vet” but i can give some insights that any new player can take regarding PvE:
there’s 4 skill groups that are vital no matter what activity you’re doing while undocked (even if its mining). those are the groups of Navigation, Engineering, Armor and Shield (Targetting and Electronics may prove usefull too but they arent a necessity). once you train those 4 to whatever the maximum limit is for you, you can properly fly and fit any ship.
each empire has 2 weapon doctrines and ships dedicated to it. usually there’s 2 ships for the main doctrine and only 1 for the other on each class so for example Amarr has 2 laserboats and only 1 droneboat on each size. this isnt perfect with all ship classes and sizes but its more or less the standard.
choose one of those and learn it to the limits you have. everyone will say “train drones and missiles” but part of the flavor in the game is on choosing your own specializations. the other weapon systems are only bad from a minmaxing standpoint but they are capable of working if you invest time and skill on mastering them. so choose one and learn it to the fullest.
Drones are usefull for everyone, i mentioned you dont have to invest on it in point 3. but as you grow in ship size, you will need them to get rid of smaller ships because your weapons wont be as effective against them so its a good secondary weapon option on all cases.
defenses are chosen the same as with weapons. basically dont dual tank, you’re wasting slots in other things that could help you apply better to enemies. some ships do it in PvP scenarios but for PvE you want to maximize your armor or shield depending on the ship you’re using (some ships can do either but others are bonused to a specific aspect, capitalize on that).
Hull tank isnt an option. or at least i wouldnt really recommend it, its good in PvP but you cannot really use it as a main line PvE defensive option, too risky.
go for what you can invest, not what the others use. that Gila may sound like the best platform to make cash but if you dont have the skills or even the money to get it just dont. grow forsomething you can buy and fit cheap and start saving your isk for improving it as you improve yourself on all aspects.
you dont need to get on a bigger ship for everything. Frigates and Destroyers are pretty capable for profitable activities. Exploration is an example but there’s other im not going to mention, its up to you to discover them.
optimize your 5 million SP limit. this is mostly advice for alpha clones. dont try to fly everything from day 1. improve on the skills on point 1 and the race you started with. if you have leftover SP after this, then you can consider crosstraining as you will have most of the required skills for fitting the ship save for its weapons (unless they use a common weapon system). otherwise you will loose from the limited pool of skillpoints you can learn over time (once you reach 5 Million SP you have to use injectors if not becoming Omega).
as for ships directly here’s a breakdown of what is avaliable and cheap for recent players:
Frigates
-Amarr -> Punisher & Tormentor (Executioner and/or Magnate could be alternatives)
-Gallente -> Tristan & Incursus (Atron is good too, i think, not sure on Imicus)
-Caldari -> Merlin & Kestrel (Condor suffers an specific bonus to a damage type, Heron is capable of even doing PvP)
-Minmatar -> Rifter & Breacher (Slasher can be good, Probe may be capable too)
-Outer Ring Excavations -> Venture (yes, mining is also a PvE activity)
Destroyers
all the destroyers of each empire are fine but you have to simulate them and choose the one you like in addition to that theres
-Society of Conscious Thought -> Sunesis (its the little brother for the Gnosis, a versatile destroyer that can fit any weapon and tank, it may be quite expensive tho).
Cruisers
-Amarr -> Maller, Omen, Arbitrator (its special because of the drone bonus)
-Gallente -> Thorax, Vexor (Celestis doesnt have a weapon bonus like the Arbitrator so its more of personal choice if you want a 3rd option)
-Caldari -> Moa, Caracal ( same as with Gallente, the Blackbird in theory can serve as 3rd combat option)
-Minmatar -> Rupture, Stabber (Bellicose is the missile option but its also an EWAR boat so take that in account)
Battlecruisers
-Society of Conscious Thought -> Gnosis (the most versatile battlecruiser in the game, its price can be hard to cover depending on the season because of its limited avalaibility)
much like with cruisers each empire has at least 1 dedicated to each doctrine. there’s also the Attack Battlecruisers (Oracle, Naga, Talos and Tornado) which use Battleship sized weapons but in turn are more nimble in terms of defense. those arent really used in PvE or at least in missions, perhaps they have a niche in other PvE combat activities that i dont know of.
Battleships
-Society of Conscious Thought -> Praxis ( the new kid on the block in the battleship neighborhood, it may be quite expensive due to being a recent addition to the game)
most of the battleships on each empire are capable of running PvE. except for the Caldari Scorpion, because it has been deemed an EWAR battleship, you can still fit it for tank and bring weapons but it may have low DPS for its size.
Industrials
i’d like to include hauelrs in this list because there’s also courier missions that you can run with them. the first lvl can be done in any Exploration Frigate. but from L2 to up you need an industrial.
any industrial from each of the empires can run them as long as you investigate which is the maximum cargo size of each mission lvl and fit the ship to do it along with proper tanking and speed mods.
you may have notice i put SoCT in the lists but not other factions, its mostly because those are the typical swiss army ships that are recommended for missions or other stuff. so i deemed it worth to mention.
Navy and Pirate ships are more of a long term investment so i wouldnt recommend rushing to them right away. first try to master what you can fly atm.
and yes, there’s a “Mastery” system for ships in the game if you’re new and dont know. you can check it in the info of the ship. it may be a good indicator in order to see how to advance with them.
Above post is pretty much bang on, though I might add the sunesis destroyer to the list of beginner ships. Similar to the gnosis in having small bonuses to everything, including scanning strength and Drone hp-dam. Some platers might have free ones or see one going cheap.
Missiles and Drones are generally a strong combination for pve, as they can both change damage types and can ignore ecm (auto targeting missiles). And the rattlesnake is probably the best ship an alpha can fly. (although a super long time before fly well on an alpha account.)
Gila is the cruiser version of the snake and is among the most flexible ships in the game. Explore, ratting, missions, Fleet Pvp, incursions.
Still expensive. Try a racial cruiser and check a few fits. Avoid ewar and logistics for solo missions, focus on applying damage and not getting dead. Fly safe!
Thank you,
You got the thing spot on, this will realy help the newbro player a lot.
PVE outside wormhole or Abyss space means:
So you need active tank with special resists and weapon system, that allows you to adjust damage type.
Both together means 2 dead space specific shield hardeners with shield booster, drones and missiles (or projectile weapon to a lesser degree).
So your best bet is Gnosis with heavy missile launcher and than Praxis with rapid heavy missile launcher. Those two ship will allow you to focus on weapon / fitting / support skills first.
Top PVE K-space game solo is mission running, where people use Rattlesnake for full room clear or Machariel for blitzing. Not solo means you have your team which will advice (or dictate) what to use in Incursions and how to fit it.