"The goal here is to get new players over as many early barriers to gameplay as possible. By throwing in a whole bunch of prereqs and adding to the basic support skill amounts we are hoping new players have faster access to a wider range of activities right out of the box.
"I was going to type out the full list of skills but you know what, you guys are pretty much better at everything than us and have already created an imgur album of the skill list so I'll just give you that! It only has the list for one faction but they are almost identical except for a couple minor changes to support skills because of differences in weapon system.
IMGUR ALBUM OF SKILLS
"One note: if you made your character in the last few days you will have less SP than people who created after Vanguard, that's not good! Some time soon after Vanguard (maybe a week or so) we will hand out 300k unallocated SP to all characters created in the two weeks leading up to Vanguard release. Sorry for having to wait a little but we gotchu."
Neville Smit did the posted images on Imgur one better by posting a single graphic for both the old and new skills given a new character. While I agreed with much of his post "Kids These Days," I'm not that worried about handing out an extra 350 thousand skill points spoiling the kids. Oh sure, my first reaction was to wonder about the effect the new plan will have on new players. But then I took a look at CCP's actual proposal.
Using the example of the new Amarr pilot, the new character will receive just under 179 hours of training, assuming that the character does not use an attribute remap. learning implants, or a cerebral accelerator. In the grand scheme of things, I don't believe getting 7 1/2 days of skill training will break the game. Perhaps the bigger effect is the value of the skill books new players will no longer need to buy. I visited Domain yesterday and the additional skills sold from NPC vendors for 10,549,500 ISK. I don't think giving new players an additional 10 million ISK is horrible, especially since CCP's long-term plan is to remove the existing career agents. CCP gives on one hand, and takes away on the other.
I reviewed the skills by category to determine the effect on the new player (or old player creating a new character). I am not an expert, so I'll let you decide if CCP chose the new player skills wisely.
Armor
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Mechanics II
Vanguard Skills Known
- Hull Upgrades III
- Mechanics III
- Repair Systems III
Cost of new skills: 90,000 ISK
Training time: 16h, 59m, 30s
The new skills give a new player 15% more armor HP, 5% more structure HP, and a 15% reduction in the duration of repair systems cycle times. Perhaps more importantly, new players can now fit Expanded Cargohold II, Inertial Stabilizers II, Nanofiber Internal Structure II, and Small Armor Repairer II without any additional training. The upgrade of Mechanics from II to III also means that the pre-requisite for Armor Layering is met, meaning a new player can immediately reduce the agility penalties for plates.
Drones
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Drone Avionics I
- Drones I
Cost of new skills: 60,000 ISK
Training time: 16m, 40s
Giving these two skills to Amarr pilots just feels like an attempt to make sure when a new player buys drones that he at least will get to launch one drone. I wonder what Gallente pilots get in the way of drone skills.
Electronic Systems
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Electronic Warfare I
- Propulsion Jamming I
Cost of new skills: 270,000 ISK
Training time: 41m, 40s
The most important takeaway from this addition is that new players do not have to train in order to fit tackle modules (warp scramblers, warp disrupters, stasis webifiers). That means a new player has the ability to keep a 100 million skill point player from running away without having to train any skills. Oh, and the ability to jam an opponent, even if weakly, will help too.
Engineering
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- CPU Management III
Vanguard Skills Known
- Capacitor Management III
- CPU Management IV
- Electronics Upgrades III
- Energy Grid Upgrades I
- Power Grid Management IV
- Thermodynamics I
- Weapon Upgrades II
Cost of new skills: 4,969,000 ISK
Training time: 2d, 9h, 19m, 36s
With these skills, new players should have a much easier time fitting their ships. The skills themselves provide a 5% increase to both a ship's CPU and powergrid output. Additionally, ships receive a 15% bonus to capacitor capacity as well as a 15% reduction in capacitor recharge time. Also, players receive a 10% reduction in the CPU needs of weapon turrets, launchers, and smartbombs.
New players will have a full range of tech 1 modules to further aid in fitting their ships. Everything from auxillary power cores to capacitor boosters, co-processors, capacitor batteries, and power diagnostic units.
Perhaps the biggest boost to new player PvP capabilities is receiving Thermodynamics I upon character creation. The 4.5 million ISK cost probably drove away some players from picking up the skill. Now, new players can overheat their modules as soon as the undock for the first time. Of course, someone will still need to explain the concept to them.
Gunnery
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Gunnery III
- Small Energy Turret III
Vanguard Skills Known
- Controlled Bursts II
- Gunnery IV
- Motion Prediction II
- Rapid Firing II
- Sharpshooter II
- Small Energy Turret III
- Surgical Strike I
- Trajectory Analysis I
Cost of new skills: 1,350,000 ISK
Training time: 1d, 4h, 13m, 41s
New players will definitely see a boost in DPS on Tuesday. The Gunnery skills will give freshly created Amarr pilots 3% bonus to weapon turret damage, a 10% bonus to rate of fire, a 10% bonus to optimal range, 5% bonus to falloff, a 10% bonus to weapon turret tracking speed as well as a 10% reduction in the capacitor need of weapon turrets.
Missiles
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Missile Launcher Operation I
Cost of new skills: 20,000 ISK
Training time: 8m, 20s
I'll admit this category had me scratching my head. I can only imagine it was a leftover from designing the Caldari new player.
Navigation
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Navigation III
Vanguard Skills Known
- Acceleration Control I
- Afterburner III
- Evasive Maneuvering I
- High Speed Maneuvering I
- Navigation III
- Warp Drive Operation I
Cost of new skills: 457,500 ISK
Training time: 6h, 6m, 40s
Yes, the bonuses (5% bonus to afterburner and microwarpdrive speed boost, 30% reduction in afterburner capacitor use, 5% reduction in MWD capacitor use, 5% improved ship agility & 10% reduction in capacitor needed to initiate warp) are nice. But for me, the ability to fit afterburners, MWD, warp core stabilizers, and warp drive accelerators without having to actively train a single skill is huge. With the full array of propulsion modules available, new players have a better chance of running away, at least from nasty NPCs.
Neural Enhancement
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Cybernetics I
Cost of new skills: 75,000 ISK
Training time: 25m
Okay, why shouldn't a new player have the ability to plug +1/+2 learning implants into his head from the beginning?
Production
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Industry I
Cost of new skills: 20,000 ISK
Training time, 8m
Industry I is needed to begin manufacturing from blueprints, so a needed skill.
Resource Processing
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Mining II
Vanguard Skills Known
- Mining III
- Salvaging III
Cost of new skills: 1,000,000 ISK
Training time: 16h, 59m, 30s
Salvaging is one of those skills that is almost a must have for new players, as salvaging can produce some needed income. The increase from Mining II to III not only produces 5% greater mining turret yield, but meets the pre-requisite for learning the Mining Upgrades skill.
Scanning
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Astrometrics I
Vanguard Skills Known
- Archaeology I
- Astrometric Acquisition I
- Astrometric Rangefinding I
- Astrometrics III
- Hacking I
- Survey III
Cost of new skills: 1,136,000 ISK
Training time: 20h
CCP is making exploration much more accessible to new players. In addition to giving characters the ability to hack relic and data sites on day one, new players will start off with a 15% increase to scan probe strength, a 10% decrease in maximum scan deviation, and a 5% reduction in scan probe scan time as compared to new characters pre-Vanguard. For those involved in PvP, new players will have the ability to use combat probes from the time they first undock. They probably won't do well, but new players will start off 20 hours closer to obtaining good results (and profits) than before.
Science
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Science III
Vanguard Skills Known
- Science IV
Cost of new skills: 0 ISK
Training time: 20h, 41m, 49s
The reason for the increase from Science III to IV is the granting of Thermodynamics I to new players. However, the additional 5% bonus to blueprint copying speed could come in handy for industrialists.
Shields
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills
- Shield Management I
- Shield Operation I
- Shield Upgrades I
- Tactical Shield Manipulation I
Cost of new skills: 499,000 ISK
Training time: 1h, 23m, 20s
Amarr ships usually don't shield tank. I can only guess that including these skills will 1) allow for experimentation and 2) allow for a player to move from Amarr to Caldari or Minmatar ships and have the ability to fit a tech 1 tank.
Spaceship Command
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- Amarr Frigate II
- Spaceship Command III
Vanguard Skills Known
- Amarr Frigate III
- Amarr Industrial I
- Mining Frigate I
- Spaceship Command III
Cost of new skills: 340,000 ISK
Training time: 8h, 9m, 2s
I welcome the granting of both the Amarr Industial and Mining Frigate skills. I hated waiting on training those skills the last time I ran an alt through the New Player Experience. The change in the Amarr Frigate skill from II to III not only gives new players one more level of frigate bonuses, but meets the pre-requisite to train the Amarr Destroyer skill.
Targeting
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Long Range Targeting I
- Signature Analysis I
- Target Management II
Cost of new skills: 263,000 ISK
Training time: 33m, 20s
Targeting may not seem like a big deal, but the 5% bonus to targeting range, 5% improved targeting speed, and ability to lock 2 extra targets that these three skills grant makes a difference when first starting out.
Trade
Pre-Vanguard Skills Known
- None
Vanguard Skills Known
- Trade II
Cost of new skills: 20,000
Training time: 47m, 57s
Giving new players 8 additional buy/sell orders is good. The fact that Trade II is the pre-requisite for Broker Relations, Marketing, and Retail is even better.
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