Unnecessary Limitations

I'm back from the wilds of Eastern Ontario and while I was getting high on nature (or the smoke fumes from the campfire) I was struck by an epiphany that I just had to share. I'm going to describe what I think is the state of the game in terms of one mechanic, then point out why this is a problematic state of affairs vis a vis new players versus veteran players, and finally I will propose a solution to this identified problem that will probably be very unpopular to the general playerbase.

Ready? Let's go!

* * * * *

Question: What is required to effectively own and pilot a ship?

Answer: There are three things you need.

First, you must have the skill points to be allowed to not only sit in the ship itself and not only to fit the appropriate modules but also the core skills that affect a ship's properties for fitting, tanking, offensiveness, and movement.

Second, you need enough ISK to afford the ship and its modules and its charges as well as enough ISK to cover its loss. I don't subscribe to the school of thought that you should have enough ISK to replace every loss but you should be comfortable enough losing a ship to not be crippled by it. I made that mistake once.

Finally, to be effective in a ship you need experience in flying it (or a ship very similar) and using its modules which usually involves some losses and missteps (more for some than others) until you become proficient.

Whether you are a one day old newbie or a 7 year veteran, these three things are a constant prerequisite for being effective in every ship in the game (1). On the surface this seems reasonable as it limits progression evenly for players to advance in a logical manner: newer players can become effective in small cheap ships that require few skill points while older players require ever increasing amounts of skill points and ISK to get into larger and more powerful ships.

Actually its not quite that clear cut and to explain why let's look at the skill list required by a new player to sit in and undock in my favourite frigate, the Incursus with my usual blaster and dual rep setup.

Gallente Frigate I
Small Hybrid Turret V
Motion Prediction III
Small Blaster Specialization I
Afterburner III
High Speed Maneuvering III
Propulsion Jamming II
Capacitor Systems Operation III
Repair Systems III
Mechanics III
Hull Upgrades I
Jury Rigging III
Armor Rigging I
Drones III
Light Drone Operation V
Drones V
Gallente Drone Specialization I

This is the bare minimum and does not include all the helper skills to improve fitting, cap use, hit points, ranges, tracking speeds, damage, etc. Now let's look at the bare minimum requirements for a player to get into a Thorax cruiser with similar fitting philosophy.

Gallente Frigate I
Small Hybrid Turret V
Motion Prediction III
Small Blaster Specialization I
Afterburner III
High Speed Maneuvering III
Propulsion Jamming II
Capacitor Systems Operation III
Repair Systems III
Mechanics III
Hull Upgrades I
Jury Rigging III
Armor Rigging I
Drones III
Light Drone Operation V
Drones V
Gallente Drone Specialization I
+
Gallente Frigate III

Gallente Destroyer III

Gallente Cruiser I

High Speed Maneuvering IV

Gunnery III

Medium Hybrid Turret V

Motion Prediction IV

Medium Blaster Specialization I

Medium Drone Operation V

Mechanics IV

Repair Systems IV

The number of additional skills for the bigger ship, guns, and drones is relatively smaller. Yes, they have more points and higher training times, but there is no additional hidden support skills to include either. Now let's look at a Megathron Battleship with same blaster concept:

Gallente Frigate I
Small Hybrid Turret V
Motion Prediction III
Small Blaster Specialization I
Afterburner III
High Speed Maneuvering III
Propulsion Jamming II
Capacitor Systems Operation III
Repair Systems III
Mechanics III
Hull Upgrades I
Jury Rigging III
Armor Rigging I
Drones III
Light Drone Operation V
Drones V
Gallente Drone Specialization I
Gallente Frigate III

Gallente Destroyer III

Gallente Cruiser I

High Speed Maneuvering IV

Gunnery III

Medium Hybrid Turret V

Motion Prediction IV

Medium Blaster Specialization I

Medium Drone Operation V

Mechanics IV

Repair Systems IV

+
Gallente Battlecruiser III
Gallente Battleship I
Heavy Drone Operation V
Gunnery V
Large Hybrid Turret V
Motion Prediction V
Large Blaster Specialization I
Mechanics V

Again, the skills have higher time investment to achieve but again the list of additional supporting skills is zero and the list of skills to get into a battleship is low compared to the original list of skills and hidden supporting skills to get into the Incursus.

Here's the rub: Although the training times to train the higher ranked skills are much higher, there are a vast number of supporting skills that a newer player has to train to be equally effective in their frigate that a veteran player already has trained for their battleship (or Tech II frigate, or super capital, or faction cruiser, ad nauseum).

In fact, I went through and added all the support skills I could reasonably identify that a players should train to make themselves move effective in that Incursus and added them to the plan to only level IV and it took the original base plan of ~23 days to 97 days. That means no support skills to level V.

But once that player has done that training, its done forever for any other ship they want to fly. That extra 74 days of support skills does not have to be trained for the Thorax or Megathron once its been trained for the new pilot. It takes longer for a new player to get all those support skills to level IV than it takes the Thorax pilot to sit in a Megathron with Tech II Neutron Blaster Cannons. Going from an Incursus to sitting in a Thorax takes less than half that time.

Support skills are a penalty to new players for being new. And this contributes directly to the horrible retention rate of new players in EVE online.

How many of you remember the Learning Skills? The same arguments for getting rid of them really apply to a lot of these skills that do very little but improve stats on modules and ships once trained and apply to most of the ships in the game. For example, Mechanics that adds 5% extra hull point per level, or Weapon Upgrades that reduces CPU needs of weapons by 5% per level, or Drone Interfacing that gives 10% damage or mining yield per level. Once a player has trained them, they apply to so many ships and situations that it becomes manadatory to have them trained to at least level IV. In other words, we penalize new players for not having these near universal skills trained out of the gate, and we penalize them in an environment where their competition includes multi-year veterans who trained these skills years ago.

No wonder people don't stick around!

Here is a hypothetical situation to highlight this tragedy. Let's say a new faction of ships was added tomorrow with its own frigates and cruisers and battleships, call them The Jovians. They have their own skill books for the ships like Jove Frigate and Jove Cruiser, etc. For me to cross train and become effective in a Jove frigate it would take mere days since I have all the support skills and weapon skills trained up being a multi-year veteran. A new player getting starting out in the Jove frigate line would require at least 100 days to even have a hope of coming close to my base statistics while flying the ship, and that ignores the advantages I have in ISK reserves and experience. And there is no way to reduce that time limit.

Over three months to even hope to be almost competitive for a Tech I frigate.

Forget about the learning cliff, we are literally stabbing newbies with a knife several times and tossing their bleeding and wounded bodies into a shark tank. With a plastic spoon for defense. The real miracle of EVE online is that its managed to survive ten years! Actually we know why EVE has managed to survive all this time, its because of the heroic efforts of many players and organizations to protect and nuture new players through this painful and unnecessary phase of learning the game, getting the ISK, and training the support skills to be effective. And its time to make their job easier by removing one of those limitations.

I encourage CCP to look into getting rid of the support skill grind. Level the playing field for new players by putting those bonuses they provide right into the ships and modules from the start and just remove the skills. Alternatively, start all players with a few million skill points and all the support skills trained to IV or V (preferably the latter). There are a zillion ways veterans have advantages in terms of ISK for faction mods, implants, boosters as well as the sheer experience advantage, so penalizing new players with lower stats adds insult to injury.

Come on CCP, do the right thing. Its better for everyone.

UPDATE:  Ripard Teg brought this up before in the winter.

1- Barring rookie ships which are free and come with skill-less modules.