There is no definite answer to this, IMO.

Hi,

I've re-subbed after years of on-off play. I have 12m sp mostly focused around PVE, but have recently realised that treating LVL4 missions as endgame is the path to boredom and un-subbing again. I've dabbled in exploration, and had some decent success, but I now plan to use that to explore PVP.

I've never really done it before, and only ever destroyed one player ship way back in 2010 I think. I've read the blogs and all the guides etc, so I know the basic t1 frig 'explode until you learn' doctrine. The kind of pvp I had in mind was low-sec frig stuff, suicide ganking for lols, missioner/explorer baiting etc.

My question is, should I make a pirate alt?

I have a sec status of 2 atm, and I know that any amount of high-sec piracy is soon going to degrade that, and I'm not in a position currently to move into null. I understand, I think, that by baiting people into aggro I can kill them without punishment, so maybe I'm best doing that?

Do most people pirate/pvp on their mains, and if so how do they get around the big hits in security status? Or do people pvp as a main and then use trader/hauler alts for practicality?

Thanks!

You could always pay for stuff in high sec and haul it with a throwaway alt (sacrificing about one weeks training for hauling) to your low sec location.

As a general rule, pvp alts are a force multiplier that everyone has. As you get them, you become dependent on them and you need more. In truth, just about every toon you see in space is an alt and there are really only a handful of unique players - probably just five guys in their parents garage some where.

... but the first statement has a truth, once you start playing with multiple accounts you IMO break the immersion of the sandbox and everything becomes meta and a lot less meaningful.

Hi,

I've re-subbed after years of on-off play. I have 12m sp mostly focused around PVE, but have recently realised that treating LVL4 missions as endgame is the path to boredom and un-subbing again. I've dabbled in exploration, and had some decent success, but I now plan to use that to explore PVP.

I've never really done it before, and only ever destroyed one player ship way back in 2010 I think. I've read the blogs and all the guides etc, so I know the basic t1 frig 'explode until you learn' doctrine. The kind of pvp I had in mind was low-sec frig stuff, suicide ganking for lols, missioner/explorer baiting etc.

My question is, should I make a pirate alt?

I have a sec status of 2 atm, and I know that any amount of high-sec piracy is soon going to degrade that, and I'm not in a position currently to move into null. I understand, I think, that by baiting people into aggro I can kill them without punishment, so maybe I'm best doing that?

Do most people pirate/pvp on their mains, and if so how do they get around the big hits in security status? Or do people pvp as a main and then use trader/hauler alts for practicality?

Thanks!

I hadn't considered trying FW, looks (from a read of the E-Uni page) like a feasible way to dip my toe into pvp without the standing loss.

Be careful using your main for FW, you can lose standing with the opposing fractions quickly and exclude yourself from traveling through half of highsec. If your standings drop too low, this can hardly be repaired. Have a look here to see what to avoid: http://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Factional_Warfare_Standings

If your source of ISK is nullsec ratting, or running missions in lowsec, you'll be grinding your security status up every time you kill a pirate NPC. So that sort of offsets the security hits you're taking in piracy. At least it doesn't hurt. If you're a really nasty lowsec pirate, you could take a sabattical in nullsec to get your security status back up.

Sec status doesn't go below -10.0, so it's not possible to dig yourself into an infinitely deep hole.

I used to think like this, but later I found out just how easy it is to fix empire standings. Running for Caldari/amarr can easily be balanced by also running missions for Sisters of Eve. Gallente/Minimatar will get balanced out by Ammatar Mandate (less optimal lp store).

Thanks again for all the help!

I'm going to take a look at corps I think, and either join a noob friendly null corp, something big like Brave maybe, or learn pvp in RvB.

I've had limited (read: no) success so far roaming low, and even managed to spectacularly throw myself on some gate guns trying to kill someone sitting afk in low! Useless.. Still, even the rush of that makes me think PvP is the future!