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Viduus
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Posted - 2003.12.19 17:22:00 -
[1]
Where's the involved explanation for Agents and how they ACTUALLY work?
The faq that's on-site gives generic information that must've been there since beta.
The only other information to be found (posted by devs) is an involved system explanation which assumes you already know what to do/where to get your research agents/skills agents/implants agents, et cetera.
I'm currently looking to get started -- the referrals I got from my n00b agent before the patch are for trans-stellar shipping and for the gallente federation navy...? yet my character is a scientist. Neither has what could be termed a research division, and standings increases to corps that ARE research oriented are so slow as to be meaningless.
A proper guide would be very, very useful....
I imagine I'm not the only *new* (I played beta, but just restarted recently) player wondering how to get going here.
Topic title changed so as not to be confused with the FAQ thread. -Elereth
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Albar Gray
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Posted - 2003.12.19 18:00:00 -
[2]
To get a reaearch agent u have to do missions for a corp with an R&D department
Such as
Lai Dai
Carthum
Roden
etc.
Most of this can be found in the organisations part of the World of Eve section of this forum
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IÆm not schizophrenic...
ThatÆs my alt
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Albar Gray
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Posted - 2003.12.19 18:04:00 -
[3]
As you do missions your standing with that corp increases.
As the standing increases you get access to better (Higher lvl and rating) agents, as well as their R&D agents.
If you have a science skill that matches those held by the R&D agents (Check his info) then you can start an R&D project with him.
After the project has been started you can use the agent info to see how it is / wil progress. Some race skill combos give bonuses of up to 3xRP 
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IÆm not schizophrenic...
ThatÆs my alt
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Albar Gray
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Posted - 2003.12.19 18:07:00 -
[4]
Some agents require 2 standings
e.g.
You need a standing of at least 4.80, and corp standing of at least 2.80, to use this service
I'm not quite sure what the corp standing bit is, but as you work for a corp now, the corp you are in slowley gets a rating with them. So that might be it.
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IÆm not schizophrenic...
ThatÆs my alt
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Charlemagne
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Posted - 2003.12.19 18:29:00 -
[5]
 Quote:
Some agents require 2 standings
e.g.
You need a standing of at least 4.80, and corp standing of at least 2.80, to use this service
Anyone else know what the 4.80 and the 2.80 are? which is corp standing and what is the other one for?
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Ralith
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Posted - 2003.12.19 18:36:00 -
[6]
First one would be your personal standing I believe (as that is the only other standing, unless they mean your sec rating).
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Manora
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Posted - 2003.12.19 19:11:00 -
[7]
Quote:
If you have a science skill that matches those held by the R&D agents (Check his info) then you can start an R&D project with him.
how do u get this skills ?
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Viduus
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Posted - 2003.12.19 21:42:00 -
[8]
Quote:
Quote:
If you have a science skill that matches those held by the R&D agents (Check his info) then you can start an R&D project with him.
how do u get this skills ?
EXACTLY! the only science skills in the schools are SCIENCE, Astrogeology, Cybernetics, Lab Ops, Metallurgy, and Research. I got lucky with my Roll, I also have Astrometrics. (skill @ long-range scanners).
None of these other "Research Skills" that I've seen mentioned are available via the market.
So the process described above is a bare-bones, missing-the-meat description....
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Tovin
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Posted - 2003.12.19 21:47:00 -
[9]
In order to get the skills that match research agents, do missions for any agents of any corp!
Level 3 agents are more likely to drop skills then level 2's, or 1's, but they all do drop them.
Once that skill is trained to at least 1, find a research agent with which you have good standing, and the same skill, and talk to him.
T
[center] Quote:
When you borrow trouble against what might be, you neglect the moment you have now to enjoy. The man who worries about what will next be happening to him loses this moment in dread |
Baldour Ngarr
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Posted - 2003.12.19 23:02:00 -
[10]
Also, of course, people who receive from their agent a tech-2-research related skill that they already trained, will be selling it; either on the market or via the trade channel. There's already a roaring trade in them at several millions apiece. So if you're stinking rich and hate doing missions, you can still get one.
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"Soon" is an ancient Icelandic word meaning "some time before the next Ice Age." |
Viduus
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Posted - 2003.12.20 01:35:00 -
[11]
Edited by: Viduus on 20/12/2003 01:36:40
Thanks - this is more useful information....
'Nother Q:
Is it better to continue with high-quality level 1 agents or move to low-quality level 2 agents?
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Tovin
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Posted - 2003.12.20 01:44:00 -
[12]
I *believe* that the only difference that's been officially noted is that a level 2 is more likely to give out the research skill sets then a level 1. I am not sure if level 2's and 3's raise standings/factions faster then 1's. I don't think anyone's given formula's, or info.....yet!
T
[center] Quote:
When you borrow trouble against what might be, you neglect the moment you have now to enjoy. The man who worries about what will next be happening to him loses this moment in dread |
Baldour Ngarr
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Posted - 2003.12.20 02:20:00 -
[13]
Quote:
I am not sure if level 2's and 3's raise standings/factions faster then 1's. I don't think anyone's given formula's, or info.....yet!
Pre-Castor, the worst level 2 agent would do so better than the best level 1; and similarly level 3 to level 2. It would be very perverse for that to have changed: after all, what else does the level indicate, except an agent being a "quantum leap" better than the ones below him.
But I can't confirm this from direct experience.
_______
"Soon" is an ancient Icelandic word meaning "some time before the next Ice Age." |
Viduus
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Posted - 2003.12.20 05:08:00 -
[14]
Your speculation holds merit.
Thanks for the input; I was otherwise prepared to stick it through with a higher level 1 agent until I could get a level 2 agent of decent statistics.
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Vasudan
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Posted - 2003.12.20 11:15:00 -
[15]
Edited by: Vasudan on 20/12/2003 11:19:27
Okay, from what I understand, this could work one of 2 ways, but untill a GM get's in here and confirms it one way or the other, I'll speculate.
Case 1:
For Example, the research agent requires 4.90 standing and 2.90 corp standing. The 4.90 refers to your standing towards the agents corp, Roden shipyards for example, the 2.90 refers to your personal corp standing towards the agents corp, in my case that would be Sirius corp.
Basically, this makes it more difficult for the small corp member or freelancer to raise the corp standing, not particuly fair I know., but does make a corp work together for the greater good.
Case 2:
Using the same numbers as above, 4.90 refers to your faction standing, Amarr for example and 2.90 refers to the standing towards the npc corp, Roden shipyards for example again.
Either way, you need to raise the standing towards the corp you want the better agent for so if you want a really good research agent, you need to do normal agent missions for the research agents corp.
As for standing increase, your personal standings towards the agent raises fairly quickly, corp standing raise very slowly and Faction standings hardly raise at all. Every now and then a mission comes along that raises the corp standing a significant amout and also raises your faction standing.
From what I've seen, any research agent with a negative quality does not have a standing requirement and normal agents don't list standing requirements at all, though you need a certain Faction standing to use better agents.
From my experience, it would seen that since patch implants are no longer given or insanly rare and it would seen no one has seen a skill since the mission hotfix
Don't hold me to any of this but this is the way it works to the best of my knowledge, need a GM to sort out all this speculation.
Anyway, hope that helps.
Vas.
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Vasudan
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Posted - 2003.12.20 11:31:00 -
[16]
Couple questions of my own.
My Level 3 agent before the patch was ranked Awesome. After Castor patch she was quality 13 and effective 17. From what I've read people have normal agents with 20 quality, the best research agent I found in Amarr was 18.
As my pre-patch lvl 3 wasn't part of a research corp, I went to find a new lvl 3 agent, again, Quality 13 (as awesome was best before the patch, and my pre-patch awesome agent was 13, I thought that was best) My new agent does not have an effective quality, why is that?
Also what exactly does having a better quality affect, does it effect and particular aspect or simply better all round (mission jumps lenths, rewards, standing increase etc)
Cheers, Vas.
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Manora
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Posted - 2003.12.20 12:29:00 -
[17]
Now i have my first research agent available
he has the skill 'Electronic engineering lvl1' and i have this skill at lvl 2
he is lvl 2, quality 18, effective quality 28, and the research rate is only 11.52 RP/day :(
there are other skill to train, or there is a big difference between agen lvl 2 and lvl 3 ?
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Papa Smurf
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Posted - 2003.12.20 13:34:00 -
[18]
Edited by: Papa Smurf on 20/12/2003 13:45:36
Edited by: Papa Smurf on 20/12/2003 13:44:00
Alot of confusion in the standings. Sorry about that. It's modeling a rather complex graph of information so the system can't really be simple by nature.
Anyhow, to talk to any agent except a tutorial agent or a research agent, your effectivestanding must be:
((level-1) * 2.0) + (quality * 5.0)/100.0
Your effective standing is your standing number, modified by any appropriate skills. The appropriate skills are Connections, Criminal Connections, and Diplomacy, each of which will give you a 4% bonus per skill level if they are appropriate. See below for info about added a bonus % to a standing number. Connections kicks in if your npc corp->char standing is positive. Criminal Connections kicks in if the agent is a criminal. Diplomacy kicks in if your npc corp->char standing is negative. These skills do not stack.
So which standing number is it? Whichever of these is best for you: npc faction->char, npc corp->char, agent->char.
Then there's an exception case, the research agents. Because of their immense worth, and to limit the impact of a myriad of old standing system bugs in Castor, they not only require the aforementioned criteria to be met, but also require you to have an effective corp standing of ((level-2) * 2.0) + (quality * 5.0)/100.0.
Tutorial agents shouldn't have any special requirements.
So how to add bonuses like above?
When standings are being modified by X%, it's not X% of your current value, it's X% of the distance left to max out. So if f.ex. you have 2.0 in standing, a 10% increase is not 0.2 which would take you to 2.2. It's 10% of (10.0 - 2.0), or 0.8, which would take you to 2.8. What this means is that the higher your standing number, the slower it grows. A 9.9 standing is thus unbelievably much better than a 9.8 standing, when compared to f.ex. the diff between 0.0 and 0.1.
Likewise, when you're losing standings, except the max there is -10.0. Thus if you are at +10.0 (theorhetically impossible), and you get a 1% standing loss, it'll carry you down to -9.8. Real bad news, compared to if you were at 0.0 or -9.0.
That's the gist of it.
Now here's some parts I'm not going to tell you the formulas for:
The amount of corp and faction standing gained when working for a particular agent is based on the agent's level and quality, in addition to varying from mission to mission. We base the standing effect of missions on average time required to do that mission as perceived in the DB. As these numbers are still mostly obsolete Gemini numbers, it doesn't make 100% sense, but will improve when we rebalance things.
The speed you gain standings with a corp or faction varies with the size of the corp/faction.
Note: there is a very useful mostly hidden feature in the UI for standings. Right click a standing entry, select show transactions, and be enlightened.
Standings decay at a rate of 5% per week. This is not calculated using the standing formula above, it's just a plain standing = standing * 0.95. So it's hard as heck to stay at the top of the standings pyramid.
The Social and Fast Talk skills apply when gaining/losing standings. Fast Talk applies when losing sec rating in space. Social applies when gaining standings via agents.
You can lose corp standing by killing NPCs in space.
You can gain/lose corp and personal standing by doing agent missions. By failing, declining, or quitting a mission you can lose the same standings. Some missions are 'important', and give faction standing as well. Most missions don't. (Important missions are a  hack as far as I'm concerned. They exist only as a late added feature due to the massive load caused by the standing system on the DB. We'll do something better in Shiva, I'd expect.).
All of the above apply to npc faction->char, npc corp->char, and agent->char standings. There are also npc faction->player corp, npc corp->player corp, and agent->player corp standings. They follow the same rules as *->char standings, and are modified simultaneously when your *->char standings are being modified. So if you f.ex. want your corp to be loved by the Amarr Empire, make sure your corp members aren't killing the Royal Amarr Navy off in space, and that they do missions for Amarr Empire corps.
The speed of standing loss/gain of player corps varies with player corp size, making larger corps have to do more actions to gain or lose standings. It's not a perfect realtime estimate, but it should do the trick.
[to be continued...]
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Sabahl
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Posted - 2003.12.20 13:40:00 -
[19]
Quote:
So which standing number is it? Whichever of these is best for you: npc faction->char, npc corp->char, agent->char.
Ahha! So this is the first value in the standings section then? The first "standing" requirement you see on an agent is equal to any one of the above? That's great! Explains a lot. I thought it was only referring to the faction standing but if it means ANY of the above it makes life a LOT easier.
Thansk for clearing this up, Papa
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Papa Smurf
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Posted - 2003.12.20 13:46:00 -
[20]
[continued]
In Castor, standings are mostly for agent purposes and sec status purposes only. The player corp standings play no role yet. Your standings do not affect things like whether you can dock, etc. And various parts of the system still are not in agreement on how they interpret your standings. This should be amended in Shiva and beyond. Standings in Castor was more about agents and making the data mean something. Nothing else was really using them worth a heck anyhow.
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Manora
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Posted - 2003.12.20 13:58:00 -
[21]
thx for the nice post Papa
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Sabahl
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Posted - 2003.12.20 13:58:00 -
[22]
Quote:
Now here's some parts I'm not going to tell you the formulas for:
The amount of corp and faction standing gained when working for a particular agent is based on the agent's level and quality, in addition to varying from mission to mission.
OK I know you said you wouldn't tell us the formulae but can you clear one thing up for us? Will a very low standing lvl 3 agent (say standing -20) give more or less standing increase on average than a very high standing lvl 2 agent (say standing 20)?
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Manora
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Posted - 2003.12.20 14:05:00 -
[23]
Quote:
Quote:
Now here's some parts I'm not going to tell you the formulas for:
The amount of corp and faction standing gained when working for a particular agent is based on the agent's level and quality, in addition to varying from mission to mission.
OK I know you said you wouldn't tell us the formulae but can you clear one thing up for us? Will a very low standing lvl 3 agent (say standing -20) give more or less standing increase on average than a very high standing lvl 2 agent (say standing 20)?
he answered here : http://oldforums.eveonline.com/?a=topic&threadID=49188
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Sabahl
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Posted - 2003.12.20 14:12:00 -
[24]
Ahhh thanks Manora.
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Viduus
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Posted - 2003.12.20 14:28:00 -
[25]
Thanks Papa Smurf, your post is about the best thing I've seen since Sliced Bread....
Just an aside though - the Tutorial Agent *last mission* is broken "Get Me Some Certificates" or whatever.
The training drones do not spawn in the training grounds.
I hope I didn't lose standings for this... :/
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Papa Smurf
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Posted - 2003.12.20 14:35:00 -
[26]
Quote:
Thanks Papa Smurf, your post is about the best thing I've seen since Sliced Bread....
Just an aside though - the Tutorial Agent *last mission* is broken "Get Me Some Certificates" or whatever.
The training drones do not spawn in the training grounds.
I hope I didn't lose standings for this... :/
Thanks Viduus, hadn't thought about the certificate issue. Lots of old spawning points like that would be broken atm. Will get it fixed ASAP.
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Papa Smurf
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Posted - 2003.12.20 16:46:00 -
[27]
btw. important note on the important mission hack:
important missions only change corp and faction standings, not personal standings.
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Stoop
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Posted - 2003.12.20 16:49:00 -
[28]
I think that the important missions come up too infrequently.
I slaved for 13 hrs yesterday doing missions, and I got only 1. I did get two skill packs, but that doesnt help since I need a higher amarr rating to get the appropriate agent =(.
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Kyndoku
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Posted - 2003.12.20 18:19:00 -
[29]
Maybe its an idea to have important mission relate in someway to your personal standing towards an agent? They could still be random but this way the chances of getting one increase slowly as you slave away with one agent.
Also makes sense from an RP point of view, they like you; they trust you; they give you important missions.
Just a thought 
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JimmySav
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Posted - 2003.12.20 18:20:00 -
[30]
what a great help this post is...keep the info coming.....
Jim'll Fix it For You. ( and you and you!)
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