Eve Online Agent Missions Guide

Agent missions at the moment are one of the safest but most boring way to make money. To start you need to climb up from a level 1 agent to a level 2 agent to a level 3 agent. This can take several days. The 3 levels all contain a different difficulty, level 1 is very easy and can with ease be done in frigates, level 2 can be done in frigates but is hard. in level 3 either a battleship or a cruiser and industrial are a must. Of course each level up will give bigger rewards.

An agents effective quality will show the height of its rewards, this can be raised by standing and by certain social skills (so can the standing with the connection skill by the way). I’d say agents are for people that like to watch television while playing and cant find a good belt to mine in, and for people that are starting the game and need their first frigate to cruiser and wish to do this solo. There are 2 different classes of agents, Research and development and regular agents.

Research and development agents will only give out rare blueprints, and are based purely on luck, no matter what you do, it will always be a lottery, I myself have had an agent for nearly 180 days and still nothing, others had 3 blueprints in a row. If you manage to get a blueprint you can make several (im serious) billions selling these items overpriced (but heck you’re nearly the only one with the print…). I’d recommend people get 1 RD agent for the sake of it, but its not a reliable way of making money. Oh yeah, and to increase the amount of Research points (RP) you dont have to do anything, but by doing missions you can sometimes double or triple the daily amount (get 200 instead of 100 once).

Regular agents: They are also based on luck, and the only big profit to be made with them is by selling the basic implants (whom give a +3 to a certain attribute) for 12 – 15 million a pop. If you’re lucky you can get one every 10 missions, I think the average is about 30 missions. but again this is based on pure luck, you can only get implants during important missions, which are pretty rare. You need a level 3 agent with 6.0 standing (at least) to get implants though. So dont expect to start of with them as it requires some work.

The rewards per missions are around 150.000 isk a pop, which is not much so I wouldn’t go for that. There are tech 2 building components to get and sell though. I have no idea how much this can make you extra per hour but it doesnt exceed mining or NPC hunting unless you’re lucky (this is what agents are based on though).

You can direct the type of missions you’ll get a bit by picking the right corporations and the right part of this corp. For example, security in Caldari navy will likely get you fighting missions. However you will still get some gun shipments, so keep that indy ready.

Now here comes the “exploit” bit – It used to be possible to stack say a million minerals and get a mineral agent, cancel the other missions and only pick missions that require the mineral you already have. Just click yes and you’re done, a friend of mine made 150 mil a night in the past with this. Its has been removed in the recent editions of EVE though i’m afraid. However theres still other ways of making more money then designed, what I do for example is have 3 level 3 agent in the same station, so you can complete three missions at a time, where others only complete one.

Eve Online Mining Guide

Mining is the most basic, and ancient way of making money in EVE. It basicly means getting a frigate, cruiser or battleship and fitting mining lasers on them. Mining is done frequently by havign a few miners in asteroid belts (which are found in nearly every system) fill up cans, and then have industrial class ships pick up the ore left in the “jetison cans”, this can also be done in secure cans, however they only anchor in less secure systems. The reason secure cans are being used is because of the fear of ore thieves! They’re people in industrial ships that will come to your cans and take the stuff in them, they cannot be shot or they will trigger concord (=police) responce. Usually the best mining ships are the ships with most gun slots (=most miners).

Frigates: The race here doesnt matter, usually frigate pilots will mine solo, therefore cargohold would be nice to have. for example, bantam, probe, imicus.

Cruiser: If you have time and money to spare for the skill i’d recommend getting the thorax, this ships got 2000 m3 drone space and 5 turret slots, so defence and mining capability are at its best with drones and 5 lasers here, a vexor or maller would be second choise, below that most ships will have near equal mining ability.

Battleships: most battleships have enough turret slots to be a pretty good miner (tempest and domi = 6, arma and mega = 7, apoc = 8 ) drone bays on these ships are all enough to keep defence at nominal levels. The best ship is offcourse the apoc, but the 1 or 2 more slots its got only insure a 12.5 or 25% higher yield, which with skills isnt that much of a diffrence (especially if its the first battleship id recommend the armageddon since its half the price).

Mining can of course be done in diffrent areas, between: 1.0 – 0.9, 0.8 – 0.5, 0.4 – 0.1, 0.0. Of course different locations have different minerals available, but as a general overview(One or 2 minerals will be missing in each area because of the location/region the belt is located – Profits are considering 1 indy and 1 battleship, solo):

1.0 – 0.9: These are some of the worst areas to mine in, these are often very close to general traveling routes and will be mine by hordes of people and stripmined by mega corperations. They will contain scordite and veldspar most of the time. also there are no pirates. Expect serveral millions per hour.

0.8 – 0.5: These belts are often mined out unless you find one out of the normal routes people have, I found a few totally unmined, this can be profitable. Common minerals are veldspar, pyrox, scordite, plagio, and in the lower security levels also omber (0.7) and kernite (0.5). Expect a few frigate pirates, but nothing drones cant handle. Also player pirates are not to be found in these sectors. Profits are again serveral millions per hour, yet more then 0.9 and 1.0, but at a slightly higher risk.

0.4 – 0.1: STAY OUT OF HERE unless in rather large groups, in my opinion this is the domain of the real player pirates, expect to find decent ore, cruiser NPC pirates, but worst of all player pirates, these are people usually working in groups of 3 or more, they will first come in with one of them, he will scan you, by this time you should already be at a station or even docked! If you plan to mine here, in any kind of group smaller than your whole corperation watch local with your life. Profit can be around 2 – 3 mil per hour per person if its mined correctly. However against the risks I suggest going back to 0.5 – 0.8 for more profit. If you know how to escape properly you can stay here. There are however sentry guns at the stations so you’re safe there.

0.0: lawless space, no sentrys, a players will is the law here. You can be killed without any security hit. However in my experience as long as the refinery and your mining spot are close to eachother there is not that much risk from players compared to immense rewards. Expect 10 – 20 million per hour or sometimes even more. The NPC’s are very powerfull and 1 or 2 battleship sized defenders are a must (or park your own tanked battleship in a safespot).

If you’re on your own i’d reccoment ninja mining, which basicly means, get a ship that can run properly. Park an indy at a safespot in the system, and mine in the ship untill you see pirates. Once you see them, run to a moon or your safespot. Wait for about 10 minutes till your scanners clear and go back. Once the can contains about the amount your indy can carry get ur indy out of its safespot and make it grab the stuff also bookmarking your mining roid is a good idea so you wont have to travel much.

My own favorite: 0.0 space, if you’re in a good allience, have a good group and dont have 2 many player pirates around this is the number one way to make money, however its only for the people with nerves of steel and people that live with the knowledge they could lose a ship daily.

For anyone that does not have this and people that are simply not ready for it yet i’d recommend 0.8 – 0.5, that is if you can find a descent system.

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Eve Online Beginners Guide to PvP

Introduction

PvP is the part of Eve were a player fights another player. It involves 2 or several ships going head-to-head to eliminate the other opponents.There is much, a skilled PvP-er knows. He knows what different setups each ship can do, he can analyze what kind of setup his opponent has due to the way he flyes his ship, he then knows the strengths/weaknesses and the way he need to counter-attack that particular setup he ‘belives’ his opponent is using according to his personal analyse and experience.

Setting up overview:

Overview is a KEY piece of information in combat. It can show u name of pilot, his current “distance”, what “size” of ship he is flying, his current “velocity”, his current “transversal velocity”, his current “corp”, etc, etc.

Explanation of the different options;

– name = pilots name

– distance = distance to pilot

– size = which ship-class pilot is flying

100 and below is frigates

100-499 is cruisers/BC (note: Ferox is 726)

500/800 is BS

– velocity = shows current speed in m/s

– transversal velocity = the bigger the number the higher tracking is needed

This is the most important tactical information i find useful in combat.

You can filter what the overview shows using “presets” which can be made by clicking the white arrow and check/uncheck on a list of different objects and afterward save them.
I got several filters like;

-“standard” which shows corp/alliance and all friendly on overview

-“gang” which filters out the above mentioned

-“gang w/gates” which includes gates for easy aligning in a fleet-operation

-“anti-drones” is for when i am flying interceptors and expect my target to release drones

– and many more personal ones like those

Setting up active-modules in-space:

I use keyboard in combat for activating modules because it enables me to do things more smoothly then by using just the mouse. I have a mx1000 mouse which has 2 regular buttons, scroll, 2 buttons on each side of scroll and 3 buttons by my left thumb.

I have setup 3 important bindings;

– Fraps

– Teamspeak push-to-talk

– Alt

The first two mentioned says itself, but why have i setup Alt on my mouse? Yes, Alt is used for the second row on the placement of modules in-space. F1-F8 is for first row, Alt+F1 – Alt+F8 is for second row. My bottom row is for armor repairers, hardeners, sensor boosters and other not so vital modules that requires a shortcut.

When i fly interceptors i got mwd, webbers and scramblers binded to F1-F3, weapons binded to Alt+F1 – Alt+F4 and repairer in low-slot for manual activation by mouse. This makes the flying more smooth then by using mouse to both control the interceptor and activating weapons and mwd when it needs to be.

Setting up your ship:

Setting up a ship requires experience with what works well and what you are setting it up for. Let`s give an example on a Maller for small engagement which i happen to know the different ships.

Maller and Thorax vs 3 Ruptures.

Out of experience i know the Ruptures is decent with both artillery and autocannons. Considering it is 2-vs-3 i need to tank to be able to survive long enough and deal decent damage. I would first put a 2x Medium T2 repairers, 800mm plate and 3x damage mods. That would be a decent tank. In mid-slots i`d use a 10mn AB for speed to get close, webber to keep current primary stay put and a scrambler to stop him warping. Now i got around 500 grid left for damage on 6 high-slots. I`d use 2-3 slots for Medium Nos to keep tank going and to suck capacitor out of opponent along with 3-4 Light Neutron Blaster II`s for best damage in the range of guns i got enough grid to fit after the Medium Nos.

That setup choice combined with the damage output of a Thorax would surely result in atleast 2 killmails, possibly 3 depending on all pilots involved experience and skills.

When you have PvP-ed long enough fitting a ship becomes second-nature. Allthough personally i tend to chose the original path when it comes to following the “rules”. My personal favorite ship-setup to this time would be my AC-Apoc for baiting gatecampers:

Highs – 6x 800 repeating and 2x Heavy Nos

Mids – Webber, 2x rechargers and heavy cap booster

Lows – 2x 1600mm plate, 2x Large T2 reppers, 3x hardeners

Note: This setup is before RMR so it`s out-dated, but i think you see my point.

Scouting and using the scanner (Ctrl+F11):

Scouting is an interceptor job which is to move ahead of a fleet and look for targets. The scout needs to have atleast -2 scrambling ability, preferably -4 and knowledge to use the scanner to track down targets.

Let`s say i enter a system with 2 in local, first thing i do is open scanner, set to max-range and 360′ degrees. I find 2 Apocs either NPC-ing or mining, what they do is not ‘that’ important.

I got 6 planets in system, 1 on each side of sun and 4 surrounding the sun. distance to the planet to left of sun is above 15 AU (max-range scan) so i ignore that planet. Planet to right of sun shows nothing when doing a 30′ degree directional scan towards it. Then i know both ships is at one of the planets surrounding the sun, so i warp to the sun (Star). Upon getting out of warp i set scanner to 30′ degrees and immediately starts scanning each planet and i get contact 1 apoc at either Planet II or Planet III, i narrow scan to 5′ degrees and check each. Target is at Planet II and before i leave i see that the other Apoc is at Planet V. Before i warp to Planet II i align and chek how many belts is at Planet II and there is only one.

Now i got 2 options;

1: I make sure i get the Apoc at Planet II – Belt 1 or

2: I start finding which belt the other Apoc at Planet V is at and when i find him i go in to tackle him while i ask a second ceptor to jump in and warp to Planet II – Belt 1

This would be the FC`s (Fleet-Commander) choice so i ask over Teamspeak what to do.

Finding a hostile in a system that is normal size and not over 60 AU long should not take more then a minute.

Note: 1 AU = 149,000,000 km which equals to 149 million km

Commanding a gang:

Commanding a gang is a difficult job which involves decisions based on your own experience and guts. You got several pilots depending on you, decisions about engagement to be made, tactical choices, etc, etc. It`s a job which few master, i for one am trying to along with many others. A commander needs to know most regular setups a ship uses, the damage output they can do, standard tactics, commanding methods, the use of authority on Teamspeak. A commander also needs to be confident in personal skills, confident voice and show discipline and be calm in hostile situations.

Priority-target calling:

Different commanders got different personal priorities to target-calling, but what every commander hates is EW (Electronical Warfare) ships like Blackbirds, Ferox’, Scorpions and similar.

If i encounter this shiplist with a normal gang i will show my priority and let`s say they are all at same range within optimal.

Armageddon, Apoc, Tempest, Zealot, Rupture, Blackbird, Scorpion, Maller, Sacrilege and 5x Maledictions:

– Blackbird EW-hazard

– Scorpion EW-hazard

– Tempest Insane damage, weak tank

– Armageddon Insane damage, weak tank

– Zealot Insane damage, weak tank, expensive loss

– Apoc Moderate damage, heavy tank

– Rupture Moderate damage, weak tank

– Sacrilege Weak damage, heavy tank

– Remaining ships Weak damage, no tank

If it`s an outnumbered situation i would call out before-hand that support is Primary to take out before we start with the heavy ships in-case we need to warp out.

Experience calling targets come over time as you gain engagements as commander under your belt.

There are several standard tactics widely used by commanders from all of Eve. The most used one is the Bait. Now, imagine you are camping Torrinos gate in ec-p8r. Camp consists of 6 BS, 5 cruisers and 3 support. Suddenly an Apoc warps to gate at 15km and everyone opens fire, now the whole camp is flagged and can`t jump through to safety. The gate flashes an X number of times and the camp is slaughtered. This is a tactic called “Bait and slaughter” which is damn effective, but experienced commanders ought to know about it.

Commanding a roaming-gang and a fleet-gang is 2 completely different situations which calls for completely different tactics. When commanding a roaming-gang you get small to moderate engagement while in fleet you can get up to 200 on each side. Personally i`m a guerilla commander, i find that easier mostly because i have never commanded a BS gang. I am sure i will eventually, but i will need more experience to the deal with being commander first.

Commanding a fleet requires you to have a more generel overview of the situation and requires more experience to the deal with being calm and comfortable comanding 50+ gangs.

It is important to set the rules once and for all. If u want people to be quiet and stop telling their ideas and opinions you better damn well be clear about it the first time. If u don`t want people to jump gates when you tell them not to then start reprimanding people that does. If you are upset with a persons attitude then i feel it`s best to say that in private. But don`t be afraid to take command and tell the gang that you mean busines and want discipline.

Discipline when in gang:

When in a gang the commander got enough on their hands with commanding the gang, thinking of tactics, talking to scouts, etc. He doesn`t need to listen to 30 peoples different ideas on how to solve the situation at hand unless he asks for it. He does not need to hear on Teamspeak what 30 people ate for breakfast unless he asks for it. You get my point? A commander don`t want your opinion UNLESS he asks for it! Many people can`t seem to remember that and needs to be told several times to basically shut up. The phrase STFU (Shut the !@#$%^&* up) is widely used, many people dislikes it, they don`t feel it`s a respectful way to be told to be quiet. Well, let me tell you. You had it coming when you started to talk about your breakfast. If you want to be treated with respect then start treating the person stepping up commanding with respect by NOT talking unless asked to.

Tackling:

Tackling a target may prove difficult from time to time with the WCS-stackers, Smartbombing-BS’, etc, etc. But it is a damn important role which needs to be done.

Tackling a BS:
When tackling a BS you got risks like Drones and Smartbombs, but your role is just to keep that BS there long enough for your gang to get to him and kill him. A well setup decent gang don`t need more then 20-30 sec to take out a BS, tanked or not tanked.

I personally fly -4 close-range tacklers and i just approach him straigth full-speed and bumping him in the process (unless it`s a sniper which will be detailed later). I load up my preset “Anti-Drones” which have friendlies filtered out and combat drones showing in-case the target deploys drones i start popping them one-by-one ’till he`s been shot down by my gang.

Tackling a sniping BS:

When dealing with sniping BS’ the distance can be up to 150km, but normally 80-110km. It`s important to keep your transversal velocity high when aproaching which can be done by flying 45′ degrees towards the target and when you are starting to move away from him be sure he has just finished shooting a volley at you before you turn around and fly 45′ degrees towards him the other way to zig-zag closer. This can be done easily when you know how to do it.

Tackling a cruiser:

When tackling a cruiser i like to orbit 500m, close and fast to be a harder target to hit. This i do because alot of cruiser pilots fit 1600mm which means small fast-tracking guns. This same tactic applies to AFs which i don`t like to tackle as you can get toasted VERY fast. A 125 II Enyo will shred an interceptor that gets close enough.

Combat tactics:

When fighting another ship it is important to fight on your own terms. Let the opponent belive he got the upper edge even though you got it. Lure your opponent to do a move that you want him to. If you are flying a close-range Maller in 0.0 and warp to a gate at 15km and you know there`s a Thorax there that you want to engage. Start approaching the gate without using the mwd you have fitted fooling the Thorax to think you are vulnerable to close-range and makes him engage you which after he gets nossed, webbed, scrambled and drones dead an easy prey. This is called tactic which you now have used to fool an opponent to engage and score a kill.

There is many tactics and traps which can effectively be used, but they are only useful if you encounter the correct situation.

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