Starting EVE and Wanting it All

I am Kahdath, New Pilot in New Eden. This blog will contain all kinds of musings from myself designed for both newbies who may wish to see another's perspective of this vast new universe and for more experienced players to see the world from a rookie's eyes.

Whilst I am new to this game, I have a number of RealLife(TM) friends who are very experienced pilots and who have been tutoring me non-stop for around a month now. As a result, I am learning things quickly, but given the skillpoint system in the game, my progress can only come so fast.

That's the main topic of this first post - what to train with all those precious skillpoints? In the month since I started, I've suffered from the 'Wanting It All' bug. Here's the slightly inefficient path I've taken to my character progression so far:

1. Create a Gallente Jin-Mei, based mainly on the fact that I love how the male Jin-Mei look and that I'm also a casual fan of Eastern themes and philosophies.
2. Train up for basic operation of frigates and destroyers and run the newbie epic mission arc (which was great fun, by the way). This arc gave the Tristan a special place in my heart, as the frigate that took me through the vast majority of it. I love watching that little 'Fat Man' hurtling through space in a warp...
   
3. Decide to take a look at this whole 'mining' thing as a reliable source of moderate income, spend best part of a week training up for a Retriever. I *love* how the ORE ships look and even though I don't use the Retriever much now, I'm glad I have one, 'cause they're just a handsome hull to call your own.
4. Spend a week or so running mining ops with McKenna's All-Weather Haulage, either hauling in an Iteron III, or mining in my Retriever. My friend brings along a big sexy Orca and we're joined by a few hulks for some solid moneymaking (at least by my standards).
   
5. Decide on Logistics specialisation as a mid-longterm plan. My friends strongly recommended the Scimitar as one of the best ships in this role. I subsequently ditch Gallente for the time being and start training up Minmatar goodness. I soon grow very fond of the Rifter and eagerly await being able to pilot a Hurricane.
6. Decide that I should build up a good base of skills and start to concentrate on some of the 'core', 'defence' and 'gunnery' certificates, slipping in occasional learning skills and ship skills.
7. Try out some friendly high-sec PVP and realise that IT IS AWESOME. Immediately leave my friendly carebear industrial corp and join up with Silentium Mortalitas. Continue with the same basic skillplan, but throw in some fleet-friendly skills like RR and so on.

So I've gone from clueless noob, to carebear miner to high/low sec pirate and general troublemaker in the space of one month. Not to mention that I still want to be able to fly the oh-so-useful freighters and get more involved in the marketeering side of things. Nightmare.

I love it.

I don't regret this lack of focus for a minute, I've already tried things in EVE that some people have never tried - some people seem terrified of losing even a single ship. Like some people have said, if I lose a ship, I'll consider it a 'tuiton fee' and do my damndest not to make the same mistake again.

For now, I'm going to concentrate on important T2 tanking and gunnery skills for ships up to and including my shiny new 'cane and do what I can to help out my new Corp, who are a pleasure to fly with, despite our apparent reputation for being nasty pirate-types.

I'll leave you with a beautiful screenshot I took during the epic mission arc - my Tristan realising the enormity of the Rogue Drone Hive I've been sent to scout. As 'Small Fish, Big Pond' metaphors go, I think it's quite fitting...