Introduction

What follows is a brief tutorial on Skills, what they are, how to understand them, and a suggestion for skill learning strategy in the EVE universe. It is a collection of personal experience and observations of colleagues.

Skills and Eve-Online

There is no class-based leveling system in EVE. Instead, there is a very extensive skill system.  Pilots can choose from a wide variety of skills and can train up to five levels in each.

Pilots start with the skills they selected during character creation, after which they may also buy skill-training books. Skill books are are sold like any other commodity, then rigged neurally to the character, much like knowledge is gained by the characters in 'The Matrix'.  Skill-training books vary widely, both in price and availability.  Once you learn a skill, you cannot unlearn it - but you don't need to.  There is no limit to the number of skills or skill points a single pilot can attain.

Character advancement is accomplished through the activation of skill training books. Once a training book is utilized, a certain period of time must elapse before training is complete and the skill is functional. The activation time required is measured in real time and training continues regardless of whether or not you are connected to the Eve.

You may only train one skill at a time and only on one character at a time per account. Time elapsed during training may be monitored through the character sheet, or by making use of the very handy third party tool called Evemon.

Skills have a number of functions in EVE. They dictate the type of ships, weapons, and equipment pilots can use and how effectively they can use them.  They also have an impact on the ability of a pilot to use station facilities and manage corporations, or how efficiently a pilot can research, manufacture, and trade within EVE.

The Clone

When your ship is destroyed in EVE, you do not immediately die. You are encased in a goo-filled capsule commonly called a "pod" (see the story The Jovian Wet Grave for more on this). If this capsule is destroyed before it gets away to the safety of another system or a station, your character dies and your clone is activated. Being shot down in EVE doesn't always result in the death of the character. Though not visible, your character is tucked away inside your pod, which is then nestled into the ship.

Most lost battles will result merely in the destruction of a pilot's ship, leaving him floating in a pod that he can pilot back to a station where he has another ship stored. If you do not have a back-up ship, a standard starter frigate will be given to you by the NPC insurance corporation.

To kill a pilot, the pod itself must be destroyed. The consequences of destroying a capsule are much more severe than destroying a ship. If a capsule is destroyed and the pilot killed, or "pod-killed," he will reappear as a cloned replica of himself.

The quality of your clone determines how many skill points you retain when the clone is activated. You start the game with a very basic clone. Wise pilots keep their clones updated so that in the event that they are pod-killed, they lose no training time. When your clone is activated and you had more skill points than the clone was rated for, you stand to lose a percentage of the 'excess' skill points. This means you would have to train some skills back up to their previous levels, losing precious training time.

The Skill Book

If you show info on any skill there are a number of tabs to view..

There are literally hundreds of skills in many different categories.  The easiest way to view available skills is to open the Market and select Skills in the Browse tab.  Each category is listed there and you are then able to expand each category to see a full list of the skills contained therein.  Make sure that you have unchecked the Show only available checkbox in the bottom left corner of the Market screen.

Every skill takes x number of hours, minutes and seconds to learn.  Typically, level 1 of each skill will take the least amount of time to learn, then as you progress, each incremental level will take longer to learn than the previous.  Two things can shorten this time variable.  The Primary Attribute and the Secondary Attribute...

Attributes

Your character's ability to learn is due to his or her attributes.

You have 5 attributes and each of these attributes has an effect on the speed that you learn differing skills.  There are Eleven skills in existence which when learned will enhance your attributes by 1 point per level of skill, with the exception of 'Learning' which gives a 2% increase to all attributes per level learned.

Below is a list of all the skill groups and their associated attributes...

Learning Strategy

As you can see, intelligence, and memory feature quite heavily in this list.  This is why it has been suggested that Instant Recall, Analytical Mind, and Learning should be your first priority.  Before learning any other skills, consider the following path...

Let me explain what is going on here...

Instant Recall level 1 will give you 1 more attribute point towards your Memory Attribute.  Analytical Mind will give you 1 more attribute point towards your Intelligence Attribute.

Learning skills use Memory and Intelligence as their Primary and Secondary Attributes.  Meaning, if you have higher levels of Memory and Intelligence Attribute, then you will learn all of the learning skills quicker.

Learning level 1 will give you a 2% boost to all your attributes.  So, lets consider what is happening here...

Let's assume you have 0 attributes across the board.  Instant Recall level 1 gives you 1 in Memory, then Analytical Mind level 1 gives you 1 in Intelligence.  Learning level 1 then gives you a 2% boost in both of those attributes, giving you 1.02 in both Memory and Intelligence.

Next you get Instant Recall level 2.  You now have 2.04 in Memory (two levels of Instant Recall and a 2% boost from having Learning level 1) and you have 1.02 in Intelligence.

Next you get Analytical Mind level 2.  You now have 2.04 in Memory, and 2.04 in Intelligence.

Next you get Learning level 2.  You now have 2.08 in both Memory and Intelligence.

You next get Instant Recall, Analytical Mind and Learning to level 3, giving you 3.18 in Memory ,and Intelligence.

Reaching level 4 in Instant Recall, Analytical Mind and Learning then gives you 4.32 in Memory and Intelligence. And so on...

The minute you get Spatial Awareness to level 1, you will have 1.08 in Perception thanks to Learning being at Level 4.

Obviously, there will be times when you will need to divert from this path.  For example, you may wish to fit an afterburner to your ship.  Before your character can fit an afterburner to any ship, he or she will need to learn the skills required to do so.  So you may wish to switch to Navigation, then to Afterburner for a short time until you have the required skills to fit that afterburner.  Just remember that while you are learning other skills, your attributes are not increasing.  The higher your attributes, the less time it takes to learn other skills.

After you have reached level 4 on Analytical Mind (Intelligence), Instant Recall (Memory), and Learning, you can then focus on training up your other attribute skills - Spatial Awareness (Perception), Iron Will (Willpower), and Empathy (Charisma) - as is appropriate for your intended career path. 

The following breakdown may be useful when deciding on a learning strategy:

•  Memory is the primary attribute for Drone skills, as well as Industry, Corporate Management and Learning skills, so they are very important. They are an absolute must for miner, production, and scientific career paths. Given its impact on Corporation Management skills, it is also important for characters involved in the management of player corporations.

•  Intelligence is the primary attribute for: Electronics, Engineering, Mechanic, Navigation, Science skills. It is an absolute must for those who want to squeeze the best performance from their ships and equipment, as well as those who wish to pursue a research career path.  It is also the secondary attribute for the Learning skills.

•  Willpower is the primary attribute for Leadership skills and elite Spaceship Command skills, as well as some Trade skills. It also is secondary to most combat skills (Gunnery and Missile skills). Therefore, it's a very important skill for commanders and 'hard-core' combat careers.

•  Perception is the primary attribute for most Spaceship Command skills as well as all Missile and Gunnery skills, and is secondary for Drone and Navigation skills, Missiles, and some important Gunnery skills.  Perception is therefore the most important attribute for combat-oriented characters. However, other character types should also consider perception important. Spaceship Command skills tend to be high rank (taking longer to learn) and are also must-have skills for pretty much all types of characters (especially if you want the option to fly many different classes of ship), so it is well worth spending time training Spatial Awareness.

•  Charisma is the primary attribute for Social skills and most Trade skills. Social skills are vital to dedicated agent mission runners, and to improve standings for such things as refine percentages. Trade skills are more important to those who play on the market as anything more than a casual purchaser/seller. It is of limited use to combat or production-oriented characters, and may be a good choice to leave at its original level unless you are a trader or mission-runner. Social, Connections, Negotiations, and Fast Talk are all important to dedicated agent runners.

General Tips

•  Try and maximize your attributes in any areas where you will be doing lots of training. For example, Navigation skills all have Intelligence as their primary attribute - so if you are about to embark on training all your Navigation skills to level four or five, then boosting your Intelligence attribute will save you substantial amounts of time.

•  Please bear in mind that training the entire "Learning" category of skills does take time. So in the short term it can put you behind other pilots who train more immediately practical skills. However, investing the time to train 'Learning' category skills early will pay off in the medium and long term. In the short run pilots starting at the same time may be able to out fly and out shoot you, but later on you might be days or even weeks ahead of them in training.

•  Skills also have ranks. This is shown as a number in parentheses after the skill name in your character sheet, and is shown as an attribute in the information about a skill. A rank two skill will take twice as long to train as a rank one skill. A rank five skills will take five times as long as a rank one skill. Most of the basic skills in the game are rank one but there are higher rank skills (such as Drone Interfacing) that are rank five. If you have low attributes, a skill such as this can take weeks to train from level four to level five, whereas raising the right attributes (through learning skills or implants) can knock days off this time.

•  When buying skillbooks, always check the length of time the sell order has remaining. Anything over 90 days is an NPC order, and therefore is the correct price for the book. If the order is anything below 90 days then it is a player selling the skill. 9 times out of 10 this will mean that the price is inflated in order for that player to earn a profit from that book.

•  You should aim to have a skill in training at all times. If a skill is due to complete in two hours and you know you are going to be away for 14 hours then, before you go, switch to training a skill that will take longer than you will be away. (You do not lose skill points if you stop training a skill, or switch to training another skill. The next time you start training that skill again, you'll begin right where you left off. Then when you log back on, switch back to finish the original skill.

A Note from the Author

I would also like to highly stress that the skills Electronics, Engineering, and Weapons Upgrades, should be learned to level 5 as soon as you can.  Any pilot will tell you that having these skills to level 5 will make fitting any ship so much easier.  Electronics will increase the amount of CPU available on all ships.  Engineering will increase the amount of Powergrid available on all ships.  Weapons Upgrades will decrease the amount of CPU required by all turrets and launchers.

There is nothing worse than having to waste low slots on Co-processors and Reactor Controls because you haven't the CPU or Powergrid available to fit your ship how you want to.

Once you have Weapons Upgrades to level 5, obtaining Advanced Weapons Upgrades level 3 is relatively quick.  Advanced Weapons Upgrades reduces the amount of Powergrid required by all turrets and launchers.

I have made the mistake in the past, as have many pilots I am sure, of spreading my learning time over too many skills and not concentrating on getting good at any of them.  Just being so so.  There is also this foolish race to get into a Battlecruiser or Battleship class vessel which many pilots enter.  Speeding towards these ships is not recommended.  If you take the path of least resistance towards a Battleship, once you are in that Battleship, you will not have the supporting skills to fit it correctly, nor pilot it correctly, and chances are you will not have the in-flight experience to use it well in combat.

Enjoy your smaller craft.  I have been able to pilot a Battleship for some time now, but I hardly ever climb into one.  And I use one for PVP even more rarely.  The smaller vessel is just as important in fleet battles as the hard hitting Battleships.  See Beginner's Guide to PVP Tackling for more information.

There are a whole host of ancillary skills that are required before even thinking about piloting a Battleship.  Capacitor, shields, armor, and hull hit points, gunnery, electronic warfare, supplementary electronics and engineering skills, and navigation skills all go towards making you a good pilot.  Neglecting these will get you killed!!

As always, please draw on the experience of your fellow pilots in Universal Army.  They are a resource of information just waiting to be tapped, and they are very happy to assist newer pilots.

Good luck pilots!!!