Petrus Blackshell
Minmatar
T.R.I.A.D
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Posted - 2011.01.14 00:24:00 -
[1]
Welcome to Eve! I've been playing for only a little more than a year, and Eve has been one of the best games I've ever played so far, so maybe I can provide some insights. Eve is not a game in the same way others are. In Eve you have to make your own "story" of sorts, and find a niche you can fill. In my case, I picked frigateering (piloting mostly frigate hulls). I like the speed, excitement, and frequent explosions.
1. I was about a week into my play when I realized the missions were repetitive and boring, so I looked for other sources of income. I have not touched missions until recently, and even now it's helping corp-mates with faction warfare missions, which can turn into PvP quite quickly.
While missions are excellent sources of ISK, there are others. Most notably, "ratting", as hunting down NPC pirates for their bounties is colloquially called. For lowsec you will need a cruiser, and for nullsec a battlecruiser is preferred, though. Less skill intensive are market manipulation and planetary interaction. Others prefer mining (though the real money is usually in lowsec or nullsec, where you will need a corporation to have the safety necessary). If you want to turn money-earning into PvP, you can pirate, take on mercenary work, or ninja-salvage.  Any of these should give more than enough ISK to get you on your way for now.
As far as joining a corp, there are plenty of newbie-friendly corps, and even a good number of training corps. You can look in the Alliance and Corporation Recruitment Center to find them. So far as outright training, I can personally recommend the people at Agony Unleashed as knowing what they're doing. I haven't trained with them, but I've shot them enough to know. 
2. Others have likely explained this better than I can, but I'll try myself. The total amount of SP (skill points) means very little, actually. For a "normal" pilot of my SP count (about 11 million), you could expect decent skills in flying Tech-2 cruisers, battlecruisers, and decent skills with battleships or so. However, I am specced to fly frigates, and instead have a lot of my SP in being able to fly all races of frigates, assault ships, interceptors, and electronic attack frigates, along with all the associated complications that multiple T2 weapons systems give. Now, of course, a 20 million SP character who also specced to fly frigates will have an edge over me, but not that much of one. Maybe he will move 100 m/s faster, do 10 more damage per second, and his capacitor will last 10 seconds longer. However, if I pick my fights in the right ship and more importantly with the right wingmates, SP starts not mattering very much. So, to answer your question: yes, it is very possible to have as much or more fun than someone with more SP than you, and to compete with them. After my 3rd week in Eve, I was a member of the Ushra'Khan null-sec alliance and having a blast. Until you learn the ropes, though, be prepared to die a lot :)
3. I always had the "late to the party" feeling too, but I made the best of it and now maintain a blog with lessons that were un-obvious to me as a newbie, and some things that even some vets don't know. Something that might be of particular interest is my experiences with the Rifter (such a great ship).
Lastly, welcome to Eve, and feel free to privmsg me or eve-mail me if you need anything. 
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