The process of equipping a ship is known as 'fitting' the ship and is an expansive topic. Ships are merely empty hulls waiting to be equipped with the guns and modules that let them do their job. EVE University's Short Skill Plan and Pyramid Skill Plan might help players plan skill training in the short and long terms, respectively. Small- and medium-sized Tech 1 hulls can take part in most activities in EVE, and even players with high-SP characters often return to these 'basic' ships, so new players should bear support skills in mind but should not be daunted by the thought of training them. An expensive Tech 2 black ops battleship, meanwhile, will be a painful loss waiting to happen if piloted by a character without well-trained support skills. A Tech 1 frigate in the hands of a days-old character can handily complete Level 1 PvE missions or significantly affect veteran pilots in advanced ships by tackling or using electronic warfare in PvP. Some of these benefit most or all ships that you can fly, making them valuable training choices.Īs a rule of thumb, smaller and lower-tech ships demand less-polished support and fitting skills from your character. In addition to the skills you will need to fit all of the guns and modules you want to use ( fitting skills), there is an entire suite of support skills that can cumulatively boost a hull's performance. While the relevant spaceship command skill may let you enter a ship and undock it from a station, this is only the first step to using the ship properly. Support skills Main article: Support skillsīeing able to fly a ship at all and being able to fly a ship well can be two very different things. This is not a hard-and-fast rule, though: it's reasonable to train straight from Tech 1 frigates into Tech 2 frigates, for instance, without ever training the skills required to fly larger Tech 1 ships, if that is your goal as a pilot. As a result, newer pilots may find themselves in large T1 ships (battlecruisers or battleships) long before they can fly a T2 ship of any size. In most cases, the prerequisites for flying bigger ships (by hull type) are faster to train than the prerequisites for higher tech levels. Likewise, the skills for Tech 2 frigates require perfecting the Tech 1 frigate command skills. To fly a Tech 1 cruiser, for instance, you must first have some training in a Tech 1 destroyer command skill. The skills for larger hull types and higher tech levels usually require some skill training in smaller hull types or lower tech levels first. This category is not to be confused with the general skill Spaceship Command. To fly ships in EVE, a character must train the relevant skills in the Spaceship Command skill category. The Sin, a Black Ops Battleship which requires months of training to fly. This local movement does not use capacitor energy, although using afterburner or microwarpdrive modules to speed the ship up does. Ships move in local space by using their engines, almost always located at the ship's stern. The engines charge these batteries and the accumulated energy is used to run active modules and power warp drives. Nearly all ships have module slots, allowing them to fit modules such as (but not limited to) weapons, armor repairers, shield boosters, armor plates, electronic warfare devices, cloaks, rigs and propulsion equipment.Īll ships have capacitor banks, similar to a gigantic battery. These hitpoints are used for tanking incoming damage. Certain NPC vessels lack shields, but all capsuleer ships have all three defensive systems, including capsules themselves. 4.1.1 Tech 1 ship class comparison tableĪ ship's defenses and durability are represented by its shield, armor and structure hitpoints.

Eve echoes ships