There is no class-based leveling system in EVE. Instead, there is a very extensive skill system. Players choose from a wide variety of skills. You can train up to five levels in each skill, each with a number of sub-levels. Characters start with skills they selected during character creation and may also buy skill-training kits, which 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 kits 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 character can attain.

Character advancement is accomplished through the activation of skill training kits. Once a training kit 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 a player is connected to the game. The training time needed for skills may range from less than an hour to several days, depending on the type and complexity of the skill. 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.

You may purchase skill packs through the market either from players or NPCs. The cost and availability will vary, based on the supply and demand of the skill.

The likelihood of an EVE character being fully trained in all available skills is virtually zero and not something that could be easily achieved. Advancing a skill, particularly at the higher levels, takes time and new skills are introduced occasionally as the game grows and additional features are introduced. Estimates have indicated that it could take as long as three years for a character to be at the top level of all available skills. By that time, many more skills will have been added.

Though it may seem like gaining skills could be a grueling process, the unique training system in EVE is unheard of in other MMORPGs and contributes greatly to EVE's appeal.

Skills have a number of functions in EVE. They dictate the type of ships, weapons, and equipment characters can use. Skills can also influence how efficiently characters can use their equipment. Furthermore, skills give the character access to certain advanced or highly specialized options in the game, ranging from advanced skills relating to researching improved weaponry to managing corporations, factories, and so forth.

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 player's ship, leaving him floating in a pod he can pilot back to a station where he has another ship stored. If the player does not have a back-up ship, a standard starter frigate will be given to him by the NPC insurance corporation.

To kill a character, the pod itself must be purposely destroyed once the ship is annihilated. The consequences of destroying a capsule are much more severe than destroying a ship. If a capsule is destroyed and the character killed, or "podded," he will reappear in 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 players 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.

You can split the paths a character selects in two main categories, combat and non-combat. Some of the more popular non-combat activities include: character advancement, exploration, trading, mining, research, manufacturing or numerous other money-making ventures. For more sociable creatures, the in-game chat channels offer an excellent means of engaging others in conversation and making new friends.

Attributes

When you create a character certain attributes are allocated to him or her. The attributes in EVE are:

• Memory

• Intelligence

• Perception

• Willpower

• Charisma

As you select certain schools and specializations during character creation, your attributes are tailored to reflect this. So for example a scientist should have higher Memory and Intelligence. A fighter will tend have higher Willpower and a trader will have higher Charisma

Importance of attributes

These attributes are the most important factor in training skills. All skills have a primary and secondary attribute. The higher the attribute, the faster any skill using that attribute will train. If you have a high attribute that is the same as the primary attribute of the skill then the skill will train faster.

If you have a weak attribute in the primary attribute of the skill you wish to train learn then the training time will be subsequently longer than it could have been. The differences in your attributes can make a SIGNIFICANT difference in the time it takes you to train a skill (especially when training higher skill levels).

To check the primary and secondary attribute requirements of a skill then left click it in skills window (in your character sheet) and select the 'Attributes' tab. If you haven't trained the skill yet then you can use 'show info' on the skill training booklet and it will also show you the primary and secondary attributes. .

Effects of attributes

Obviously the attribute setup you get at creation will have a big influence on what skills you can train quickly. As mentioned before, if you have specially created a character for fighting then you should automatically have reasonably higher Perception and Willpower attributes (which are the primary attributes linked for training to all Gunnery class skills.

This means you will not take as long to learn gunnery skills but it does mean that if you suddenly decide to change career path and move into research, for instance, then your attributes will probably not be as ap pro priate and it will take you much longer to train a skill.

Improving attributes

You are not stuck with the attributes you get at character creation; it is possible to improve on these by using skills in the Learning skills category. There are six basic learning skills - one for each attribute, plus a general learning skill which reduces all learning time by approximately two percent per level.

By training the basic attribute learning skills it is possible to increase your base attribute by up to 5 points each. If you are considering playing the game long term then the "learning" category skills will save you a significant amount of time, allowing your character to progress much more quickly.

Many people will generally increase their entire "Learning" category learning/attribute skills to at least level three or level four. As learning level five skills take a long time to train, it takes a long time for them 'repay' themselves in saved time, longer for the training effort to be repaid in saved time on other skills.

It is probably not worth training them up to level five unless you know for sure that you are going to be doing a lot of training using particular attributes.

• If, for example, you decide to become a fighter and are going to have to train a lot of Gunnery class skills, training Spatial Awareness (perception) and Iron Will (willpower) skills to level five will repay itself very quickly!

How to train attributes

Obviously training of learning and attribute skills also takes time. The primary attribute required for the learning class of skills is Memory and the Secondary is Intelligence.

Therefore, if you train the Instant Recall (memory) and Analytical Mind (Intelligence) skills first it will save you time training the others. The Memory and Intelligence attributes play a role in the training of many useful skill classes so you should consider training them up to at least Level three (and preferably level four) as soon as possible.

The following is one suggested training routine for a new character which will help you maximize your learning and attribute skills most quickly. It is based on calculations not explained here:

• Instant Recall (Memory) Level 1

• Analytical Mind (Intelligence) Level 1

• Learning Level 1

• Instant Recall (Memory) Level 2

• Analytical Mind (Intelligence) Level 2

• Learning Level 2

• Instant Recall (Memory) Level 3

• Analytical Mind (Intelligence) Level 3

• Learning Level 3

• Instant Recall (Memory) Level 3

• Analytical Mind (Intelligence) Level 3

• Learning Level 3

• Instant Recall (Memory) Level 4

• Analytical Mind (Intelligence) Level 4

• Learning Level 4

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 ap pro priate for your intended career path.

Implants

Implants can also raise your base attributes and save you significant training time. A variety of implants are available on the market or through agent missions. They can raise an attribute by 1 (called "Limited" implants), 2 ("Limited - Beta"), 3 ("Basic") or 4 ("Standard") points. At the moment it is possible to get basic implants which boost the main attributes by +3 points per attribute or standard implants which add +4. There are five types of implants available covering the 5 main attributes areas:

• Cybernetic Subprocessor (affects Intelligence)

• Memory Augmentation (affects Memory)

• Occular Filter (affects Perception)

• Neural Boost (affects Willpower)

• Social Adaptation Chip (affects Charisma)

Using an implant requires some skill in Cybernetics (level 1 for Basic, level 3 for Limited and Limited - Beta, and level 4 for Standard implants). The Cybernetics skill requires Science level 3 before you can begin to train it. (( Figure out which is correct and change this and the previous paragraph accordingly; is the progression "basic" -> "limited" -> "limited - beta" -> "standard" or is it "limited" -> "limited -beta" -> "basic" -> "standard"? Right now these two paragraphs disagree on the right progression. ))

You can only plug in one implant per attribute. Implants are destroyed if you try and remove them from your head, so once you have plugged it in it cannot be taken off and used by anyone else.

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 attributes skills does take time. So in the short term it can put you behind other players who train more immediately practical skills. However, investing the time to in train "Learning" category skills early will pay off in the medium and long term. In the short run people starting at the same time may be able to out fly and out shoot you, but later on you might be hours or even days 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 several days to train from level four to level five, whereas raising the right attributes (through implants or attribute-specific skills) can knock days off this time.

• If you go to the skills tab screen of your character information sheet (on your character sheet - top left button on the left hand menu) you can see your total skills point amount is in the top upper left. You can start training a skill by right clicking a particular skill and selecting 'Start Training Train to level...' you should also see a time it will take for that skill to train to the next level. To train skills you do not already have, you need to purchase the skill's book training kits. You can buy the kits for many skills in the station at which your character started. You need to open the market station service. Initially set the "market range" to "This station only," or you will need to travel to pick up the skill. Select the Browse tab and select "Items," then "Skills," screen (make sure it is set to 'This Station Only') and then you should see a 'skills' section. You can also obtain some of the new higher rank research skills from agents.

• Some times unscrupulous players will buy the entire supply of basic skill training kits in a starting station and resell them at an unfair price. If you feel that the purchase price for a skill seems excessively high, try expanding the "market range" to 'constellation' or 'region'. You will often find better prices at nearby systems. The downside, of course, is that you must travel to that system to pick up any purchases.

• 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 the training to another longer skill. (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. Do not cancel the training; simply start another one). Then when you log back on, switch back to finish the original skill.

Skill groups and attributes

Here is a list of the skill groups and their associated Attributes:

Attributes and skills

• 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.

• 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, 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). Perception is also the secondary skill for Drones, Gunnery, and Navigation 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.