Difference between revisions of "Missions"

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{{update|Agency}}{{MissionLinks}}A '''mission''' is a job offered by an non-playing character to a player which requires the player to accomplish a set of objectives in exchange for a set of rewards.  
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{{MissionLinks}}
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{{related class|Missions (CORE class)}}
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A '''mission''' is a task offered by a non-player character (NPC) to a player that requires the player to accomplish a set of objectives in exchange for a set of rewards. Such NPCs are called [[agents]] and they describe the task and specify the rewards for its completion.
  
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==Three Common Mission Types==
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== Mission levels ==
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There are three standard types of missions: {{color|#cee686|Security}} given by security agents, {{color|#cee686|Mining}} given by mining agents, and {{color|#cee686|Distribution}} given by distribution agents.  
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Mission levels go from 1 to 5. Higher level missions generally requires that you have better skills and access to bigger ships. Higher level missions also increase [[#Rewards|rewards]]. A mission's level is identical to the offering [[agents]] level with the exception of [[#Storyline missions|Storyline missions]]. As your corporation and faction standing increases, you'll gain access to higher level agents and thus missions.
  
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'''[[Security missions]]''' are for the combat oriented pilots. The job is usually to kill pirates, retrieve stolen goods or to destroy strategic targets. These missions have the highest rewards but they are also slower and involve risk of dying. When people talk about missions they usually mean security missions.
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* '''Level 1''' The most basic type. Can be run by basic [[frigates]]. Only the most basic [[Starting skills|piloting skills]] are required.
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* '''Level 2''' While Mining and Courier missions may be run in frigates, Encounter is designed for [[cruiser]] hulls. You are expected to improve your abilities and learn how to [[Fitting ships|fit out new ships]].
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* '''Level 3''' As you specialize, you will need a [[battlecruiser]], [[Mining Barge]], or a medium-sized [[hauler]]. These missions go faster if you have trained for better ships and at least some [[Tech 2]] fittings.
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* '''Level 4''' These require a [[battleship]], an [[exhumer]], or a large [[hauler]]. These missions can be time-consuming, but they offer large rewards. These missions require [[Omega clone|omega]] to run.
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* '''Level 5''' Mostly encounter (combat) missions designed for [[#Missioning with a fleet|groups of players]] or [[capital ships]] and are exclusively located in Low Security space. Like level 4, these also require omega to run.
  
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'''[[Mining missions]]''' are given out by Mining agents and require you to mine an asteroid or set of asteroids and bring the ore back to the agent's station. There is a risk of combat in mining missions, though the "belt pirate" NPC hostiles that show up are usually rather weak. Note that Mining missions pay off in ISK and Loyalty points, you do not get ore from Mining missions. See [[mining missions]] for more details.
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== Mission types ==
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Mission type is an in-game parameter that can be found in the mission journal.
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{{Open journal}}
  
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'''[[Distribution missions]]''' require the movement of a cargo from one station to another. Distribution missions never require combat, though, of course, you may encounter PvP combat on the way to your destination. Distribution missions are fastest mission type to run so they are sometimes used for fast standing gains.
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[[File:Missing Cargo Warning.jpg|thumb]]
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'''[[Distribution missions|Courier mission]]s''' (also referred to as distribution) require shipping cargo from station to station. Courier missions have no inherent combat. Courier missions are the fastest mission type to run so they are sometimes used for fast standings gains. Courier missions produce a warning when trying to leave the pick-up station without the required cargo in your hold.
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{{Clear}}
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'''[[Mining missions]]''' require you to mine a specific <em>mission</em> ore and bring it back to the agent's station. Level 1 and 2 mining missions have no inherent combat. There is however always a risk of combat during mining missions, through the "[[belt rat]]" NPC hostiles that can show up and are usually rather weak. Note that mission ore except [[Lyavite in Incursions|Lyavite]] has no other uses and can not be traded on the market.
  
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== Mission Levels==
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'''Trade missions''' The agent wants a specific item to "trade" for the reward. Trade missions have no inherent combat of itself. Trade missions do not occur as basic missions but show up as Storyline and COSMOS missions. The item(s) to trade can often be bought of the market or in contracts but you can also acquire them yourself which might require mining or combat.
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Mission levels go from low to high: 1 to 5. As you go up in level, the missions generally require that you have more skills and access to bigger ships, but they also provide better rewards. The level of a [[#Agents and Standings|Mission Agent]] tells you the level of missions that the agent will offer. Each agent offers only one level of missions.
 
  
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*'''Level 1''' is where most new players start. Most, if not all, level 1 missions can be done in a basic frigate, Only the most basic [[Starting_Skills|piloting skills]] are required.
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'''Talk to Agent missions''' (also referred to as travel). The agent sends you to report to another agent. Initiating communication with that agent completes the mission. These missions occur as part of Epic Arcs.
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*'''Level 2''' mining missions stepping up from a frigate. These missions generally expect that you are continually improving your piloting skills and learning how to [[Fitting_Guidelines|fit out new ships]].
 
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*'''Level 3''' missions require a [[Battlecruiser|battlecruiser]], a mining barge, or a medium-sized industrial ship. These missions go faster if you have trained for better ships and at least some [[Tech_2|Tech 2]] fittings.
 
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*'''Level 4''' missions require a [[Battleship|Battleship]], an [[Exhumer]], or a large industrial ship. These missions can be time-consuming, but they offer large rewards.
 
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*'''Level 5''' missions are designed for groups of players or capital ships and are exclusively located in Low Security space.
 
  
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==Agents==
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'''Agent Interaction missions''' (also referred to as branch). The agent offers you the choice of 2 or more missions. Conforming your choice completes the interaction mission and accepts the mission of your choice. These missions occur as part of Epic Arcs.
  
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All common mission agents have a name, a Level, and a Division. "Level" describes the general difficulty level of the mission that the agent can offer you and can range from 1 to 5; it also affects the standings you need to reach in order for this agent to give you missions. "Division" determines what type of mission - security (combat), distribution (hauling), or mining - you will be offered. <ref name="inferno15">https://community.eveonline.com/updates/patchnotes.asp?patchlogID=226</ref>
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'''[[Security missions|Encounter missions]]''' are all other missions. Mostly combat-focused. The job is usually to kill pirates, retrieve stolen goods, or destroy strategic targets. But sometimes it is doing a recon (i.e. go to the target area, look and leave) or transporting items from or to a structure (<em>not a station</em>) somewhere in space. Unlike "true" courier missions encounter transport missions will <em>not</em> warn you when you try to leave the pick-up location without the cargo in your hold. These missions have the highest rewards but they are also slower and involve a risk of dying.
  
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An agent will offer you missions only when your standings reach a certain amount, depending on the agent's level:
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== Mission categories ==
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* Level 1: Any standings
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=== Basic missions ===
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* Level 2: 1.00 or higher
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Basic missions are offered by regular agents and are of the types: Courier, Mining or Encounter. Basic missions are randomly allocated out of a pool except for the missions in a [[#Mission chain|mission chain]].  
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* Level 3: 3.00 or higher
 
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* Level 4: 5.00 or higher
 
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* Level 5: 7.00 or higher
 
  
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You must meet this requirement for either the agent's personal standing towards you, their corporation's standing towards you, or their faction's standing towards you; any one of the three will suffice. All three standings need to also be above -2.00 to receive higher than L1 missions.  
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=== Storyline missions ===
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As you continue to complete missions, you will occasionally get a Storyline Mission offer from a special Storyline agent. The game tracks how many missions you've completed for each combination of level and faction. For every 16 missions of {{Co|lime|''the same level and faction (but not necessarily the same corporation)''}} that you complete, you will get a new Storyline mission offer from the nearest Storyline agent of the same faction. This will always be the Storyline agent closest to the regular agent who gave you your 16th mission (in terms of number of jumps) with two exceptions:
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* If the closest Storyline Agent has already made you an offer that you haven't accepted or declined, then it will be the second-closest Storyline agent that you get the offer from.
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* If the agent who gave you the 16th regular mission that you completed was in High Security, then the Storyline offer will always come from a Storyline agent in High Security.
  
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For example, Eveynel Daerne is a Level 3 agent in Orduin IX - Moon 4 - Transstellar Shipping Storage. This agent is part of the Transstellar Shipping corporation, which is part of the Gallente Federation faction.  The standings requirement is therefore 3.0, so The agent, corporation and faction standing needs to be above -2.00 and at least one of the following 3 conditions must be true to get missions from Eveynel Daerne:
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The Storyline agent will contact you from a station - you will get a notification about an important mission offer - however, you will need to travel to the agent's station to accept the mission. Once you are in touch with the Storyline agent, you accept and complete the mission in the usual way. You cannot work for a Storyline agent unless you've received an offer from that Agent.
  
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* Eveynel Daerne's personal standing towards you is 3.0 or higher.
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Completing a Storyline mission gives large increases to your standing with the agent's corporation and a moderate increase to faction standing. Note that you will also get derived standings, both positive and negative, towards other factions. If you keep doing Storyline missions for [[Minmatar Republic]] you will find that [[Gallente Federation]] will also like you while [[Amarr Empire]], [[Caldari State]] and various pirate factions will gradually start to dislike you.
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* Transstellar Shipping's standing towards you is 3.0 or higher.
 
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* The Gallente Federation's standing towards you is 3.0 or higher.
 
  
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The fact that Eveynel Daerne is located in the Orduin solar system, which is the sovereign territory of the Minmatar Republic, is completely irrelevant. High Minmatar Republic standings will not give you access to missions from Eveynel Daerne. This concept applies as a rule to all agents of a faction who are located in a different faction's sovereign space.
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When trying to increase standings with a particular NPC corporation, it is possible to plan your missioning in a way that when you hand in your 16th mission, you get your offer from the Storyline agent of the corporation that you are focusing on.
  
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==Standings==
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Storyline missions are of the types courier, encounter, or trade. There is no relation between the mission type and the issuing Storyline agent's division.
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{{main|NPC standings}}
 
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Standings are a measure of how much one entity in EVE likes or dislikes another. These feelings are measured on a scale from -10 to +10 where negative is hatred and positive is love. Completing missions changes your standing with the agent, the agent's corporation, in some cases the agent's faction and, in security missions, the faction of the entities that you kill.
 
  
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The standings of NPC entities toward a player are important for a couple reasons. Firstly, because higher standings make more profitable missions available. And secondly, because several perks become available when an individuals or player-run corporations standings are higher with a specific entity.
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[[The InterBus]] and militia corporations do not offer any Storyline missions.
  
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<div style="margin:0; margin-right:100px; margin-left:100px">{{ important note box | Be aware: security missions can make your standings go up with one faction and simultaneously down with another. Repairing poor standing is hard work so it is very much recommended that you don't accept missions against empire factions too lightly. }}</div>
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=== Special missions ===
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These mission types are not regularly available and are bound by conditions you need to fulfill before they are offered to you.
  
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An agent will offer you missions only when your standings reach a certain amount, depending on the agent's level:
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==== Career missions ====
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{{Main|Career Agents}}
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Also known as "Tutorial missions", are missions that are supposed to help teach players how to play EVE Online. It is a good idea to do these when you first start playing EVE, as they give you starter ships and equipment. They also increase your standings with the faction offering the missions. Each player character can only do each tutorial mission from a given [[Career Agents|Career Agent]] once, but the Career agent mission chains do count as Storyline missions and thus increase faction standings after completing a full set.
  
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* Level 1: Any standings
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==== Research missions ====
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* Level 2: 1.00 or higher
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{{Main|Research missions}}
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* Level 3: 3.00 or higher
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Are a part of the [[Industry]] career path. Instead of ISK and Loyalty Points, these missions award Research Points that can be used to buy [[datacores]] from the agent who gives the missions. You will need to have trained various Science skills to the level required by an agent before they will offer you a mission. Datacores can be sold at the Market, and some players run these missions to make ISK from trading - do keep in mind that the income is quite low. Most players, however, have not trained the Science skills that these missions require. Research missions do count for the storyline mission tally.
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* Level 4: 5.00 or higher
 
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* Level 5: 7.00 or higher
 
  
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Agents' standings are determined in part by your standing with their parent corporations. Because of this, there is an advantage to running your missions with the agents from same corporation. Each completed mission will raise your standing with that agent ''and'' the agent's corporation and move you more quickly towards the next level. In addition, because Loyalty Point stores are run by corporations, you will be able to buy more items faster if you stick with one corporation.
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==== Epic arcs ====
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{{Main|Epic arcs}}
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Are long series of missions. Throughout the arc, you will be offered choices that will branch the arc into one or more directions, and thus the arcs have different outcomes depending on your choices. The missions that make up these arcs typically have very good ISK rewards and the last mission of the arc carries a handsome reward. There are seven Epic Arcs. Most players begin with [[The Blood-Stained Stars]], an arc that can be completed in a T1 destroyer and gives a boost in standings with the [[Sisters of EVE]] and one empire faction of your choice. Seasoned L4 runners will be doing the four empire epic arcs while the fearless pilots can do the two pirate epic arcs. Epic arcs can be repeated once every three months. Epic arcs missions do not give Loyalty points <ref group=Note>At least [[The Blood-Stained Stars]] does not.</ref>. Epic arc missions do count for the storyline mission tally.
  
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When you complete a regular mission for an agent, you get increased standings with the agent and the corporation, but not the faction. It is worth noting that if the mission involves destroying ships or structures of a different faction, then your standings with the target faction go down due to "Combat - Ship Kill". Those who wish to be able to fly in all High Security space are advised to decline all anti-Empire missions (that is, anti-Amarr, anti-Ammatar, anti-Caldari, anti-Gallente, anti-CONCORD and anti-Minmatar). Some exceptions or workarounds exist; for example, a Minmatar agent might give you the mission [[Friendly Spies]], where if you destroy the mission objective but none of the hostile ships, then you don't lose Gallente Federation standings. In other cases, the standing losses due to "Combat - Ship Kill" are almost insignificant, such as [[Amarrian Tyrants (Level 3)]]. Some missions, though, will incur -2.4% standing losses for ship kills and might require one or more completed storyline missions for the opposing side to repair the standings losses.
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==== Anomic missions ====
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{{Main|Anomic missions}}
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Also known as "burner" missions, are optional Security missions that are offered by level 4 agents. They can always be declined without penalty. Anomic missions present a more difficult challenge compared to other Security missions. You will encounter a small number of very powerful adversaries and you are restricted in ship size. These missions require specialized and expensive ship fits and high skills to solo. They also require piloting skills that are otherwise rarely used in PvE such as [[overheat]]ing.
  
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To see a history of how your standings have changed, you can go to [[NeoCom]] > Character Sheet > Standings, scroll through the list of NPC entities and select the entity you are interested in to see how much your standings went up or down for what actions and by how much. Note though that due to a bug the graph presented shows wrong values (jan 29 2018).
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==== COSMOS ====
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{{Main|COSMOS}}
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Are special missions found in certain regions of space. These missions vary wildly in difficulty from easy L1 to harder-than-usual L4. Unlike normal missions these missions require '''faction''' standings to accept. The COSMOS missions are offered only once and can not be repeated. If you let them expire or fail them they will not be offered to you again and the following missions will not be offered to you. COSMOS missions do not reward loyalty points.
  
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See [[NPC standings]] for more details.
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==== Data center ====
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{{Main|Data centers}}
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Involve handing in tags to the agent for standing gains. This effectively allows you to buy faction standings. Note though that each data center mission can be done only once.
  
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==Rewards==
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== Mission chain ==
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A mission chain is a series of connected missions. Completing a mission will automatically offer the next mission in the chain. Some mission chains share a single [[#Offer timer|offer timer]]. Chain missions can be of a different type than is usual for the agent's division. Mission chains can usually be identified by some form of "part x of y" in the title of the mission but not always (see the mission chain [[Survey Rendezvous]], [[Listening Post]] and [[Kicking the Nest]] for an example).
  
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Completing missions will reward you with isk, loyalty points and standings.
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== Rewards ==
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Completing missions will reward you with ISK, [[Loyalty Points]], standings and occasionally with items.
  
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Being paid with isk is clear for everyone but new missioneers often forget about the Loyalty points that they gain whilst running missions. Loyalty Points are a currency that you receive from the Corporation whose agent gives you a mission. These points can be used to buy things at the Corporation's store. These points (plus a small amount of ISK or items) can be exchanged for valuable items in the Loyalty Points store of the mission agent's corporation. For some players it is more profitable to accumulate Loyalty Points in order to exchange them for goods which can then be sold than it is to kill, loot and salvage in security missions. See [[Loyalty Points]] for more details on what to do with LP.
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The amount of ISK received is influenced by the {{sk|Negotiation}} skill giving 5% additional ISK per skill level.
  
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The mission isk and LP rewards also scale with the system security of the agent by extra 10% isk, LP and standings for 0.1 decrease in security rating. This means that an agent in 0.5 security system pays 50% more than an agent in 1.00 security system. The rewards are also dynamically adjusted based on past completion data. This dynamic calculation affects isk payout, LP payout, bonus reward and bonus time.<ref name="ddynamic rewards">http://eve-search.com/thread/795200-0/page/1#1</ref>
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Being paid with ISK is clear-cut, however, new missioneers often forget about Loyalty points they gain whilst running missions. Loyalty Points (LP) are a currency that you receive from the corporation whose agent gives you a mission. These points can be used to buy things at the corporation's store. LP (plus a certain amount of ISK and/or particular items) can be exchanged for valuable items in the LP store of the mission agent's corporation. For some players, it is more profitable to accumulate LP to exchange them for goods that can then be sold than it is to kill, loot, and salvage in encounter missions. See [[Loyalty Points]] for more details on what to do with LP.
  
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Gaining improved standings with agent, corporation or faction can also be lucrative. With higher standings you will be able to take higher lvel missions, pay less broker fees in NPC stations and get cheaper refining in NPC stations. See [[NPC standings]] for all advantages of standings.
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The mission LP rewards scale with the system security of the agent and the level of the "Division" Connections skill. The formula for calculating the LP reward is:
  
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You will also receive isk from bounties while killing NPC in combat missions. You will often get mroe isk from bounties than from mission reward. You will also be able to loot and salvage the wrecks though it is often more profitable to skip this.
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: <math> \displaystyle \text{ LP reward } = \text{ Base LP } \times (1.6288 - \text{ System security }) \times (1 + \text{ "Division" Connections }\times 0.1) </math>
  
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==Storyline Missions==
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This means that an agent in a 0.5 security system pays 80% more than an agent in 1.0 security system. Note that the system security used here is the [[System security#True security|true security]] of the system.
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As you continue to complete missions, you will occasionally get a Storyline Mission offer from a special Storyline agent. In fact these offers will happen exactly every 16th mission for same factions. This agent will suddenly contact you from a station, however, you may need to travel to the agent's station in order to accept the mission. Once you are in touch with the Storyline Agent, you accept and complete the mission in the usual way.
 
  
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The game tracks how many missions you've completed for each level and each faction. For every 16 missions of the same level and faction (but not necessarily the same corporation) that you complete, you will get a new Storyline Mission offer from the nearest storyline agent of the same faction. This will always be the Storyline Agent closest to the regular agent who gave you your 16th mission (in terms of number of jumps) with two exceptions:
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The "Division" Connections skills are:
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* {{sk|Distribution Connections}} - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Distribution division.
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* {{sk|Mining Connections}} - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Mining division.
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* {{sk|Security Connections}} - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Security division.
  
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* If the closest Storyline Agent has already made you an offer that you haven't accepted or declined, then it will be the second-closest Storyline Agent that you get the offer from.
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The rewards are also dynamically adjusted based on past completion data. This dynamic calculation affects ISK/LP payout, bonus reward, and timed bonus reward.<ref name="dynamic rewards">[https://oldforums.eveonline.com/?a=topic&threadID=795200 https://oldforums.eveonline.com/?a=topic&threadID=795200 On the mission reward balancer]</ref>
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* If the agent who gave you the 16th regular mission that you completed was in High Security, then the Storyline offer will always come from a Storyline Agent in High Security.
 
  
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You cannot work for a Storyline Agent unless you've received an offer from that Agent.
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When you complete a regular mission for an agent, you get increased standings with the agent and the corporation, but not the faction. It is worth noting that if the mission involves destroying ships or structures of a different faction, your standings with the target faction will go down due to a "Combat - Ship Kill" malus. Those who wish to be able to fly in all of High Security space are advised to decline all anti-Empire missions (that is, anti-Amarr, anti-Ammatar, anti-Caldari, anti-Gallente, anti-Minmatar and anti-CONCORD). Some exceptions or workarounds exist; for example, a Minmatar agent might give you the mission [[Friendly Spies]], where if you destroy the mission objective but none of the hostile ships you won't lose Gallente Federation standings. In other cases, the standing losses due to "Combat - Ship Kill" are almost insignificant, such as [[Amarrian Tyrants (Level 3)]]. However, some missions will incur -2.4% standing losses for ship kills and might require one or more completed storyline missions for the opposing side to repair the standings losses.
  
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Completing a Storyline Mission large increases your standings with the agent's corporation standing and moderate increase faction standings. Note though that you will also get derived standings, both positive and negative. So if you keep doing storyline missions for [[Minmatar Republic]] you will find that [[Gallente Federation]] will also like you while [[Amarr Empire]], [[Caldari State]] and various pirate factions will gradually start to dislike you.
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Accepting, and then quitting a level 4 mission will result -6.2% agent, -2.5% corporation and about -0.1% faction standing loss.
  
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When trying to increase standings with a particular NPC corporation, it is possible to plan your missioning such that when you hand in your 16th mission, you get your offer from the Storyline Agent of the corporation that you are focusing on.
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Gaining standings with an agent, corporation or faction can be lucrative. With higher standings, you will be able to take higher level missions, pay fewer [[Trading#Broker's fee|broker fees]] in NPC stations and get cheaper [[reprocessing]] in NPC stations. See [[NPC standings]] for all advantages of standings. The amount of standing received is influenced by the {{sk|Social}} skill giving 5% bonus per level to NPC agent, corporation and faction standing increase.
  
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==Declining Missions==
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You will also receive ISK from bounties while killing NPC pirates, not [[Factions#Empires|empire factions]]. You will often get more ISK from bounties than from the mission reward. Bounties are a fixed amount per ship type so the total bounty depends on number and types of ships you destroy.
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[[File:Decline-mission.jpg|thumb|right|The "decline mission" timer tells you how long you have to wait until you can decline another mission from this agent without losing standing.]]
 
  
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Declining a mission for a particular agent more than once every four hours will also cause a standings loss with the agent, corporation, '''and faction'''. Also running out of time on a mission you have accepted will cause a standings loss with the agent, corporation, '''and faction'''.
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You will also be able to loot and [[salvage]] the wrecks though it depends on the mission level and killed NPCs whether it is profitable or not. There is always a rare chance of an item of considerable value dropping as loot.
  
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If an agent you recently declined a mission from offers you another undesirable mission, you can click DELAY, wait out the four hour timer while you go do something else, and then decline.
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== Mission related timers ==
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=== Offer timer ===
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[[File:Opportunities-mission card-offered.png|thumb|Opportunities mission card with offer timer. Identified by the orange speech balloon on the agent portrait.]]
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The offer or acceptance timer starts when talking to the agent and has a duration of 6 to 7 days. When the mission is not accepted in this time frame the agent will withdraw the offer and send you a message, telling you how displeased they are:
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{{Quote|I can no longer await your response to my offer. I am displeased by your indecisiveness.}}
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Letting the offer timer expire has no consequences for your standings.
  
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Note: Anomic missions can be declined and cancelled with no penalty. They also won't count for the 1/4h declining limit.
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Note: COSMOS missions are a one shot offer, so letting the offer expire means that that mission and all missions after that one are no longer available.
  
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==Finding Agents==
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The offer timer can be found:
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* in the Opportunities overview by hovering over the hourglass in the bottom right corner of the tile (countdown timer)
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* in the Opportunities mission details view (countdown timer)
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* in the mission journal (timestamp)
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{{Open journal}}
  
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You can search for agents in the agency window.
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[[File:Mission journal.png|center|frame|The mission journal showing an accepted mission with the completion timer, a non expiring offered mission and an offered mission with the offer timer.]]
  
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These two web-based tools offer the same data as the in-game Agent Finder, but in an easier format. <span style="color:#aaaaaa">(Easier once you get the hang of it!)</span>
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=== Completion timer ===
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*[https://util.eveuniversity.org/Missions/AgentRangefinder/ Agent Rangefinder]
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[[File:Opportunities-mission card-accepted.png|thumb|Opportunities mission card with completion timer. No speech balloon on the agent portrait.]]
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*[https://eve-online.itemdrop.net/eve_db/agents/ Itemdrop]
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The completion timer starts when accepting the mission and has a duration of 7 days. Letting the completion timer expire will cause the mission to fail. And will incur a standings penalty with the agent, corporation and faction.
  
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==Special missions==
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The completion timer can be found:
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These mission types are not as widely available as the basic three.
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* in the Opportunities overview by hovering over the hourglass in the bottom right corner of the tile (countdown timer)
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* in the Opportunities mission details view (countdown timer)
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* in the mission journal (timestamp)
  
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'''[[Career Agents|Career missions]]''', also know as Tutorial missions, are missions that are supposed to help new players learn how to play EVE Online. It is a good idea to do these tutorials when you first start playing EVE, as they give valuable ships and equipment, and the increase your standings with the faction offering the missions. Each player character can only do each Tutorial Mission from a given [[Tutorial and Career Agents in Eve|Tutorial Agent]] once ever, but the tutorial mission chains do count as Storylines in increasing corporation and faction standings.
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=== Bonus timer ===
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The bonus timer starts with the completion timer and has a duration from 10 minutes to 6 hours. Completion of the missions within the bonus timer grants a bonus reward.
  
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'''[[Research missions]]''' are a part of the [[Industry]] career path. Instead of Loyalty Points, these missions award Research Points that can be used to buy datacores from the agent who gives the missions. You will need to have trained various Science knowledge to the level required by an agent before he or she will offer you the mission. Datacores can be sold in the Market, and some players run these missions to make ISK from trading. Most players, however, have not trained the science skills that these missions require.
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The bonus timer can be found on the right side of the Agent Conversation window in the Bonus Rewards section.
  
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'''[[Epic arcs]]''' are long series of missions. Throughout the arc, you will be offered choices which will branch the arc in one or more directions, and thus the arcs have different outcomes depending on your choices. The missions that make up these arcs typically have very good ISK rewards and the last mission of the arc typically carries a handsome reward. There are seven Epic Mission Arcs. Most players begin with [[The Blood-Stained Stars]], an arc that can be completed in a T1 frigate and gives a boost in standings withe Sisters of Eve. Seasoned L4 runners will be doing the four empire epic arcs while the fearless pilots can do the two pirate epic arcs. Epic arcs can be repeated once every three months.
+
=== Decline missions timer ===
 +
[[File:Decline-mission.jpg|thumb|The "Decline mission" timer tells you how long you have to wait until you can decline another mission from this agent without losing standing.]]
 +
The decline missions timer starts when declining a mission and has a duration of 4 hours. See {{Section link||Declining missions}}.
  
−
'''[[Anomic missions]]''' (also known as "burner" missions) are optional security missions that are given out by level 4 agents. They can always be declined without penalty. Anomic missions present a different and higher challenge compared to other security missions. You will encounter a small number of very powerful adversaries and you are restricted in ship size. These missions require specialized and expensive ship fits and high skills to solo. They also require piloting skills that are otherwise rarely used in PvE such as overheating.
+
The decline timer can be found on the left side of the Agent Conversation window in the last paragraph of text.
  
−
'''[[COSMOS]]''' missions are special missions found in certain regions of space. These missions vary wildly in difficulty from easy L1 to harder-than-usual L4. Unlike normal missions these missions require faction standing to accept. The COSMOS missions can be completed only once.
+
== Declining missions ==
 +
Declining a mission for a particular agent more than once every four hours will cause a standings loss with the agent, corporation, '''and faction'''.
  
−
'''[[Data centers]]''' missions involve handing in tags to the agent for standing gain. This effectively allows you to buy faction standings. Note though that each data center mission can be done only once
+
If an agent you recently declined a mission from offers you another undesirable mission, you can click DELAY, wait out the four hour timer while you go do something else, and then decline.
−
 
+
{{Clear}}
−
==Missioning with a Fleet==
+
== Missioning with a fleet ==
−
{{Main|Mission Fleets}}
+
{{Main|Mission fleets}}
−
Members of a fleet who run missions can share all of the standings, LP and ISK reward from the mission and bounties automatically. Loot, and/or salvage can be shared by hand. This is especially good for newer players, as they generally gain more standings than they share. There are two main kinds of mission fleet: Spider, where everyone runs their own missions, but shares standings, etc. at the end; and Locust, where the fleet members all work on the same mission together. Read the article on [[Mission Fleets]] for more details.
+
Members of a fleet who run missions can share all of the standings, LP, and ISK rewards from the mission and bounties automatically. Loot and/or salvage can be shared by hand. This is especially good for newer players, as they generally gain more standings than they share. There are two main kinds of mission fleet: Spider, where everyone runs their own missions, but shares standings, etc. at the end; and Locust, where the fleet members all work on the same mission together
−
 
 
−
==Skills==
 
−
In addition to all the ship, piloting, fitting and combat skills you may need there are also skills that are more focused to missions and standings.
 
  
−
There are four skills that improve your standings. These skills neve apply simultaneously.
+
== Advice for new mission runners ==
−
* {{sk|Connections}} - 4% Modifier to effective standing from friendly NPC Corporations and Factions per level. Does not apply to criminal factions.
+
If you're new to mission running and your goal is to gain loot, pile up LP to buy things or to increase your standing with a faction, then you may want to lay out a plan to help you run your missions with a minimum of down time. Here are some suggestions.
−
* {{sk|Criminal Connections}} -  4% Modifier per level to effective standing towards NPCs with low Concord standing. Only applies to criminal factions.
 
−
* {{sk|Diplomacy}} - 4% Modifier per level to effective standing towards entities that have negative standings with you.
 
−
* {{sk|Social}} - 5% bonus per level to NPC agent, corporation and faction standing increase.
 
−
 
 
−
There are four skills that improve the payout from missions.
 
−
* {{sk|Distribution Connections}} - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Distribution corporation division.
 
−
* {{sk|Mining Connections}} - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Mining corporation division.
 
−
* {{sk|Security Connections}} - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Security corporation division.
 
−
* {{sk|Negotiation}} - 5% additional isk pay per skill level for agent missions.
 
−
 
 
−
==Advice for new mission runners==
 
−
 
 
−
If you're new to mission running and your goal is to gain loot, or pile up loyalty points to buy things, or to increase your standing with a faction, then you may want to lay out a plan to help you run your missions with a minimum of down time. Here are some suggestions.
 
  
 
'''1. Pick an area in which to work'''
 
'''1. Pick an area in which to work'''
  
−
The last thing you want is to be running missions in the middle of a contested low sec region where combatants will shoot at you, or in systems that lie on a busy trade route where pirates will gank you. Use the map and look for a group of fairly high security systems set off from the major trade routes. It's also nice to have multiple star gates nearby, just in case you need to run for it. But do not wander too far from your corp mates if you are in war as the war targets will gladly destroy a lone mission runner.
+
The last thing you want is to be running missions in the middle of a contested low sec region where combatants will shoot at you, or in systems that lie on a busy trade route where griefers will target you. Use the map and look for a group of fairly high security systems set off from the major trade routes and other active systems. Keep in mind that you can be scanned down in mission pockets and war targets will attempt to do so.
  
 
[[File:Good_mission_map.jpg‎|500px]]  [[File:Bad_mission_map.jpg‎|400px]]
 
[[File:Good_mission_map.jpg‎|500px]]  [[File:Bad_mission_map.jpg‎|400px]]
  
−
'''2. Know what you need; and check out what the various agents offer'''
+
'''2. Know what you want; check out what the various agents offer'''
  
−
Successful mission runs give you ISK and Security missions can also give you loot. They also give you standing with the agent that gave you the mission and the agent's corporation, and the agent's faction. And, they give you loyalty points that can be redeemed for items in the corporation's store.
+
Successful mission runs give you ISK and Encounter missions can also give you loot. They also give you standing with the agent that gave you the mission, the agent's corporation, and the agent's faction. In addition, they give you LP that can be redeemed for items in the corporation's store. The corporation you gain LP for is important.
  
−
Most corporation stores sell the same sets of [[Implants#Attribute_Enhancers|augmentation implants]]. However, different corporations offer different sets of [[List_of_Skill_Hardwiring_Implants|skill upgrade implants]], and different factions offer different modules, hulls and ammunition. Roden Shipyards, for example, sells warp drive and astrometric skill upgrades, while Astral Mining offers mining upgrades. Weapons and ammunition offers correspond to the faction's spaceship preferences - Minmitar offer projectile weapons and ammo, while Ammar offer laser weapons and crystals, and so on.
+
Most corporation stores sell the same sets of [[Implants#Attribute Enhancers|augmentation implants]]. However, different corporations offer different sets of [[Skill Hardwiring|skill upgrade implants]], and different factions offer different modules, hulls and ammunition. Roden Shipyards, for example, sells warp drive and astrometric skill upgrades, while Astral Mining offers mining upgrades. Weapons and ammunition offers correspond to the faction's spaceship preferences - Minmitar offer projectile weapons and ammo, Ammar offer laser weapons and crystals, and so on.
  
−
'''3. Pick A Corporation With Agents In The Region'''
+
'''3. Pick a corporation with multiple agents in the region'''
  
−
Nearly every station has at least one agent, and there are many duplications in terms of standings and items offered for sale. So if you want to improve your standing with the Gallente, for example, and you want to buy some mining skill upgrades, then Astral Mining is one of the corporations you would want to consider. Since there are many Astral agents in Gallente space, choosing this corporation will not restrict your choice of star systems all that much.  
+
Nearly every station has at least one agent, and there are many duplications in terms of standings and items offered for sale. So if you want to improve your standing with Gallente and you want to buy equipment to improve your mining, then Astral Mining is one of the corporations you would want to consider. Since there are many Astral Mining agents in Gallente space, choosing this corporation will not restrict your choice of star systems all that much.  
  
−
Once you have a goal in mind, use the Agent Finder to narrow your choices of star system. Keep in mind that when you finish running level 1, you will almost certainly have to move to a new system to find a level 2 agent, and again for level 3. So try to find a group of level 1-2-3 agents that are fairly close together.
+
Once you have a goal in mind, use the Agent Finder to narrow your choices of star system. Keep in mind that when you finish running level 1, you will almost certainly have to move to a new system to find a level 2 agent, and again for level 3 and 4. So try to find a group of level 1-2-3-4 agents that are fairly close together.
  
−
To avoid unfavorable missions such as low security missions and missions that require you to kill empire ships you will need to decline missions every now and then. It is best to choose yor location so that you have second and even third agent as backup once you can't any more decline the mission offer from first agent.
+
To avoid unfavorable missions such missions in low/null security space and missions that require you to kill empire ships you will need to decline missions every now and then. It is best to choose your location so that you have a second and even third agent as backup once you can't decline the mission offered from the first agent without losing standings.
  
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'''4. Pick A Base Station And Start Running'''
+
'''4. Pick a base station and start running'''
  
 
Here is the map for that area:
 
Here is the map for that area:
 
[[File:Verge_vendor_mission_map.jpg‎]]
 
[[File:Verge_vendor_mission_map.jpg‎]]
  
−
You need a base because as you go along, you will buy ships, ammunition and other gear, and you will pick up loot and junk from completed missions. It's easiest to keep all this stuff in one place, so plan to go to your agent's base to run missions, and fly back to your base when you need to resupply. It is often best to bring all the refit modules and extra ammo to the station with agent so you don't need to jump around more than is needed.
+
You need a base because as you go along, you will buy ships, ammunition and other gear and you will pick up loot and salvage from completed missions. It's easiest to keep all this stuff in one place, so plan to go to your agent's base to run missions, then fly back to your base when you need to resupply. It is often best to bring all the refit modules and extra ammo to the agent's station so you don't need to travel more than is needed.
  
 +
=== Two hints for being sure your mission is complete ===
 +
* Look for a green check mark next to the mission
 +
: [[File:Missioncheckmark.jpg‎ |alt= where the green checkmark appears]]
  
−
===Two hints for being sure your mission is complete===
+
* If you think the mission is finished but you don't see the green checkmark or want to check your objectives, click on the little down arrow next to the mission name and select "Details" from the menu. This will show you the mission briefing and you can take another look at your objectives.
  
−
*Look for a green check mark next to the mission
+
Note that some missions may not get this completion mark.
−
:[[File:Missioncheckmark.jpg‎ |alt=where the green checkmark appears]]
 
  
−
*If you think the mission is finished, but you don't see the green checkmark, or if you're not sure what you need to do to finish, click on the little down-pointing arrow beside the mission name and select "details" from the menu. This will show you the mission statement and you can see what you still have to do to complete it.
+
=== Mission preparation and walkthroughs ===
 +
Never fly what you cannot afford to lose applies to running missions as well. When starting, fly the cheapest ship that will do the job and only pay for expensive upgrades once you're sure you can replace them. Also, keep in mind that no activity is 100% safe, mission runners can get scanned down and ganked and even an empty transport ship can become a target for a bored ganker.
  
−
Note though that some missions may not get this completion mark.
+
NPC's in missions tend to be very predictable in their setups. For example, Gallente and Serpentis use only Kinetic and Thermal damage against you and are most susceptible to Kinetic and Thermal damage themselves; when they use any form of [[EWAR]], it's always sensor dampening. It helps quite a bit if you set up your ship to deal damage that NPCs are vulnerable to and defend against what they will throw at you. Check out [[NPC damage types]] for a full description and a handy chart that you can keep in your Neocom Notebook.
  
−
===Mission Preparation and Walkthroughs===
+
== Notes ==
 +
<references group=Note />
  
−
The first rule is to never fly what you cannot afford to lose. Even distribution missions can fail if you get ganked. So fly the cheapest ship that will do the job.
+
== References ==
 +
<references />
  
−
Know also that NPCs in missions tend to be very predictable in their setups. For example, Gallente and Serpentis use only Kinetic and Thermal damage against you, but are also most susceptible to Kinetic and Thermal damage themselves; when they use any form of [[EWAR]], it's always sensor dampening. It helps quite a bit if you set up your ship to deliver damage that the NPCs don't like and defend against what they will throw at you. Check out [[NPC damage types]] for a full description and a handy chart that you can keep in your Neocon Notebook.
+
[[Category:Missions]]
−
 
 
−
[[Category: Missions]]
 
−
 
 
−
==References==
 
−
<references />
 

Latest revision as of 10:51, 17 June 2024

Agent.png
Missions
Mission Reports
Mission Guides
Special Missions
Helpful Links
E-UNI Emblem.png EVE University offers
a class on:

A mission is a task offered by a non-player character (NPC) to a player that requires the player to accomplish a set of objectives in exchange for a set of rewards. Such NPCs are called agents and they describe the task and specify the rewards for its completion.

Mission levels

Mission levels go from 1 to 5. Higher level missions generally requires that you have better skills and access to bigger ships. Higher level missions also increase rewards. A mission's level is identical to the offering agents level with the exception of Storyline missions. As your corporation and faction standing increases, you'll gain access to higher level agents and thus missions.

  • Level 1 The most basic type. Can be run by basic frigates. Only the most basic piloting skills are required.
  • Level 2 While Mining and Courier missions may be run in frigates, Encounter is designed for cruiser hulls. You are expected to improve your abilities and learn how to fit out new ships.
  • Level 3 As you specialize, you will need a battlecruiser, Mining Barge, or a medium-sized hauler. These missions go faster if you have trained for better ships and at least some Tech 2 fittings.
  • Level 4 These require a battleship, an exhumer, or a large hauler. These missions can be time-consuming, but they offer large rewards. These missions require omega to run.
  • Level 5 Mostly encounter (combat) missions designed for groups of players or capital ships and are exclusively located in Low Security space. Like level 4, these also require omega to run.

Mission types

Mission type is an in-game parameter that can be found in the mission journal.

With the Viridian expansion the mission journal was removed from the Neocom and the short-cut settings. Its keyboard short-cut was assigned to the newly introduced opportunities window.

However, for the time being as of 7 September 2024, the mission journal can still be called using the slash command /open journal in any of the chat windows.


Missing Cargo Warning.jpg

Courier missions (also referred to as distribution) require shipping cargo from station to station. Courier missions have no inherent combat. Courier missions are the fastest mission type to run so they are sometimes used for fast standings gains. Courier missions produce a warning when trying to leave the pick-up station without the required cargo in your hold.

Mining missions require you to mine a specific mission ore and bring it back to the agent's station. Level 1 and 2 mining missions have no inherent combat. There is however always a risk of combat during mining missions, through the "belt rat" NPC hostiles that can show up and are usually rather weak. Note that mission ore except Lyavite has no other uses and can not be traded on the market.

Trade missions The agent wants a specific item to "trade" for the reward. Trade missions have no inherent combat of itself. Trade missions do not occur as basic missions but show up as Storyline and COSMOS missions. The item(s) to trade can often be bought of the market or in contracts but you can also acquire them yourself which might require mining or combat.

Talk to Agent missions (also referred to as travel). The agent sends you to report to another agent. Initiating communication with that agent completes the mission. These missions occur as part of Epic Arcs.

Agent Interaction missions (also referred to as branch). The agent offers you the choice of 2 or more missions. Conforming your choice completes the interaction mission and accepts the mission of your choice. These missions occur as part of Epic Arcs.

Encounter missions are all other missions. Mostly combat-focused. The job is usually to kill pirates, retrieve stolen goods, or destroy strategic targets. But sometimes it is doing a recon (i.e. go to the target area, look and leave) or transporting items from or to a structure (not a station) somewhere in space. Unlike "true" courier missions encounter transport missions will not warn you when you try to leave the pick-up location without the cargo in your hold. These missions have the highest rewards but they are also slower and involve a risk of dying.

Mission categories

Basic missions

Basic missions are offered by regular agents and are of the types: Courier, Mining or Encounter. Basic missions are randomly allocated out of a pool except for the missions in a mission chain.

Storyline missions

As you continue to complete missions, you will occasionally get a Storyline Mission offer from a special Storyline agent. The game tracks how many missions you've completed for each combination of level and faction. For every 16 missions of the same level and faction (but not necessarily the same corporation) that you complete, you will get a new Storyline mission offer from the nearest Storyline agent of the same faction. This will always be the Storyline agent closest to the regular agent who gave you your 16th mission (in terms of number of jumps) with two exceptions:

  • If the closest Storyline Agent has already made you an offer that you haven't accepted or declined, then it will be the second-closest Storyline agent that you get the offer from.
  • If the agent who gave you the 16th regular mission that you completed was in High Security, then the Storyline offer will always come from a Storyline agent in High Security.

The Storyline agent will contact you from a station - you will get a notification about an important mission offer - however, you will need to travel to the agent's station to accept the mission. Once you are in touch with the Storyline agent, you accept and complete the mission in the usual way. You cannot work for a Storyline agent unless you've received an offer from that Agent.

Completing a Storyline mission gives large increases to your standing with the agent's corporation and a moderate increase to faction standing. Note that you will also get derived standings, both positive and negative, towards other factions. If you keep doing Storyline missions for Minmatar Republic you will find that Gallente Federation will also like you while Amarr Empire, Caldari State and various pirate factions will gradually start to dislike you.

When trying to increase standings with a particular NPC corporation, it is possible to plan your missioning in a way that when you hand in your 16th mission, you get your offer from the Storyline agent of the corporation that you are focusing on.

Storyline missions are of the types courier, encounter, or trade. There is no relation between the mission type and the issuing Storyline agent's division.

The InterBus and militia corporations do not offer any Storyline missions.

Special missions

These mission types are not regularly available and are bound by conditions you need to fulfill before they are offered to you.

Career missions

Main article: Career Agents

Also known as "Tutorial missions", are missions that are supposed to help teach players how to play EVE Online. It is a good idea to do these when you first start playing EVE, as they give you starter ships and equipment. They also increase your standings with the faction offering the missions. Each player character can only do each tutorial mission from a given Career Agent once, but the Career agent mission chains do count as Storyline missions and thus increase faction standings after completing a full set.

Research missions

Main article: Research missions

Are a part of the Industry career path. Instead of ISK and Loyalty Points, these missions award Research Points that can be used to buy datacores from the agent who gives the missions. You will need to have trained various Science skills to the level required by an agent before they will offer you a mission. Datacores can be sold at the Market, and some players run these missions to make ISK from trading - do keep in mind that the income is quite low. Most players, however, have not trained the Science skills that these missions require. Research missions do count for the storyline mission tally.

Epic arcs

Main article: Epic arcs

Are long series of missions. Throughout the arc, you will be offered choices that will branch the arc into one or more directions, and thus the arcs have different outcomes depending on your choices. The missions that make up these arcs typically have very good ISK rewards and the last mission of the arc carries a handsome reward. There are seven Epic Arcs. Most players begin with The Blood-Stained Stars, an arc that can be completed in a T1 destroyer and gives a boost in standings with the Sisters of EVE and one empire faction of your choice. Seasoned L4 runners will be doing the four empire epic arcs while the fearless pilots can do the two pirate epic arcs. Epic arcs can be repeated once every three months. Epic arcs missions do not give Loyalty points [Note 1]. Epic arc missions do count for the storyline mission tally.

Anomic missions

Main article: Anomic missions

Also known as "burner" missions, are optional Security missions that are offered by level 4 agents. They can always be declined without penalty. Anomic missions present a more difficult challenge compared to other Security missions. You will encounter a small number of very powerful adversaries and you are restricted in ship size. These missions require specialized and expensive ship fits and high skills to solo. They also require piloting skills that are otherwise rarely used in PvE such as overheating.

COSMOS

Main article: COSMOS

Are special missions found in certain regions of space. These missions vary wildly in difficulty from easy L1 to harder-than-usual L4. Unlike normal missions these missions require faction standings to accept. The COSMOS missions are offered only once and can not be repeated. If you let them expire or fail them they will not be offered to you again and the following missions will not be offered to you. COSMOS missions do not reward loyalty points.

Data center

Main article: Data centers

Involve handing in tags to the agent for standing gains. This effectively allows you to buy faction standings. Note though that each data center mission can be done only once.

Mission chain

A mission chain is a series of connected missions. Completing a mission will automatically offer the next mission in the chain. Some mission chains share a single offer timer. Chain missions can be of a different type than is usual for the agent's division. Mission chains can usually be identified by some form of "part x of y" in the title of the mission but not always (see the mission chain Survey Rendezvous, Listening Post and Kicking the Nest for an example).

Rewards

Completing missions will reward you with ISK, Loyalty Points, standings and occasionally with items.

The amount of ISK received is influenced by the Negotiation skill giving 5% additional ISK per skill level.

Being paid with ISK is clear-cut, however, new missioneers often forget about Loyalty points they gain whilst running missions. Loyalty Points (LP) are a currency that you receive from the corporation whose agent gives you a mission. These points can be used to buy things at the corporation's store. LP (plus a certain amount of ISK and/or particular items) can be exchanged for valuable items in the LP store of the mission agent's corporation. For some players, it is more profitable to accumulate LP to exchange them for goods that can then be sold than it is to kill, loot, and salvage in encounter missions. See Loyalty Points for more details on what to do with LP.

The mission LP rewards scale with the system security of the agent and the level of the "Division" Connections skill. The formula for calculating the LP reward is:

[math] \displaystyle \text{ LP reward } = \text{ Base LP } \times (1.6288 - \text{ System security }) \times (1 + \text{ "Division" Connections }\times 0.1) [/math]

This means that an agent in a 0.5 security system pays 80% more than an agent in 1.0 security system. Note that the system security used here is the true security of the system.

The "Division" Connections skills are:

  • Distribution Connections - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Distribution division.
  • Mining Connections - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Mining division.
  • Security Connections - Improves loyalty point gain by 10% per level when working for agents in the Security division.

The rewards are also dynamically adjusted based on past completion data. This dynamic calculation affects ISK/LP payout, bonus reward, and timed bonus reward.[1]

When you complete a regular mission for an agent, you get increased standings with the agent and the corporation, but not the faction. It is worth noting that if the mission involves destroying ships or structures of a different faction, your standings with the target faction will go down due to a "Combat - Ship Kill" malus. Those who wish to be able to fly in all of High Security space are advised to decline all anti-Empire missions (that is, anti-Amarr, anti-Ammatar, anti-Caldari, anti-Gallente, anti-Minmatar and anti-CONCORD). Some exceptions or workarounds exist; for example, a Minmatar agent might give you the mission Friendly Spies, where if you destroy the mission objective but none of the hostile ships you won't lose Gallente Federation standings. In other cases, the standing losses due to "Combat - Ship Kill" are almost insignificant, such as Amarrian Tyrants (Level 3). However, some missions will incur -2.4% standing losses for ship kills and might require one or more completed storyline missions for the opposing side to repair the standings losses.

Accepting, and then quitting a level 4 mission will result -6.2% agent, -2.5% corporation and about -0.1% faction standing loss.

Gaining standings with an agent, corporation or faction can be lucrative. With higher standings, you will be able to take higher level missions, pay fewer broker fees in NPC stations and get cheaper reprocessing in NPC stations. See NPC standings for all advantages of standings. The amount of standing received is influenced by the Social skill giving 5% bonus per level to NPC agent, corporation and faction standing increase.

You will also receive ISK from bounties while killing NPC pirates, not empire factions. You will often get more ISK from bounties than from the mission reward. Bounties are a fixed amount per ship type so the total bounty depends on number and types of ships you destroy.

You will also be able to loot and salvage the wrecks though it depends on the mission level and killed NPCs whether it is profitable or not. There is always a rare chance of an item of considerable value dropping as loot.

Mission related timers

Offer timer

Opportunities mission card with offer timer. Identified by the orange speech balloon on the agent portrait.

The offer or acceptance timer starts when talking to the agent and has a duration of 6 to 7 days. When the mission is not accepted in this time frame the agent will withdraw the offer and send you a message, telling you how displeased they are:

“

I can no longer await your response to my offer. I am displeased by your indecisiveness.

”

Letting the offer timer expire has no consequences for your standings.

Note: COSMOS missions are a one shot offer, so letting the offer expire means that that mission and all missions after that one are no longer available.

The offer timer can be found:

  • in the Opportunities overview by hovering over the hourglass in the bottom right corner of the tile (countdown timer)
  • in the Opportunities mission details view (countdown timer)
  • in the mission journal (timestamp)

With the Viridian expansion the mission journal was removed from the Neocom and the short-cut settings. Its keyboard short-cut was assigned to the newly introduced opportunities window.

However, for the time being as of 7 September 2024, the mission journal can still be called using the slash command /open journal in any of the chat windows.


The mission journal showing an accepted mission with the completion timer, a non expiring offered mission and an offered mission with the offer timer.

Completion timer

Opportunities mission card with completion timer. No speech balloon on the agent portrait.

The completion timer starts when accepting the mission and has a duration of 7 days. Letting the completion timer expire will cause the mission to fail. And will incur a standings penalty with the agent, corporation and faction.

The completion timer can be found:

  • in the Opportunities overview by hovering over the hourglass in the bottom right corner of the tile (countdown timer)
  • in the Opportunities mission details view (countdown timer)
  • in the mission journal (timestamp)

Bonus timer

The bonus timer starts with the completion timer and has a duration from 10 minutes to 6 hours. Completion of the missions within the bonus timer grants a bonus reward.

The bonus timer can be found on the right side of the Agent Conversation window in the Bonus Rewards section.

Decline missions timer

The "Decline mission" timer tells you how long you have to wait until you can decline another mission from this agent without losing standing.

The decline missions timer starts when declining a mission and has a duration of 4 hours. See § Declining missions.

The decline timer can be found on the left side of the Agent Conversation window in the last paragraph of text.

Declining missions

Declining a mission for a particular agent more than once every four hours will cause a standings loss with the agent, corporation, and faction.

If an agent you recently declined a mission from offers you another undesirable mission, you can click DELAY, wait out the four hour timer while you go do something else, and then decline.

Missioning with a fleet

Main article: Mission fleets

Members of a fleet who run missions can share all of the standings, LP, and ISK rewards from the mission and bounties automatically. Loot and/or salvage can be shared by hand. This is especially good for newer players, as they generally gain more standings than they share. There are two main kinds of mission fleet: Spider, where everyone runs their own missions, but shares standings, etc. at the end; and Locust, where the fleet members all work on the same mission together

Advice for new mission runners

If you're new to mission running and your goal is to gain loot, pile up LP to buy things or to increase your standing with a faction, then you may want to lay out a plan to help you run your missions with a minimum of down time. Here are some suggestions.

1. Pick an area in which to work

The last thing you want is to be running missions in the middle of a contested low sec region where combatants will shoot at you, or in systems that lie on a busy trade route where griefers will target you. Use the map and look for a group of fairly high security systems set off from the major trade routes and other active systems. Keep in mind that you can be scanned down in mission pockets and war targets will attempt to do so.

Good mission map.jpg Bad mission map.jpg

2. Know what you want; check out what the various agents offer

Successful mission runs give you ISK and Encounter missions can also give you loot. They also give you standing with the agent that gave you the mission, the agent's corporation, and the agent's faction. In addition, they give you LP that can be redeemed for items in the corporation's store. The corporation you gain LP for is important.

Most corporation stores sell the same sets of augmentation implants. However, different corporations offer different sets of skill upgrade implants, and different factions offer different modules, hulls and ammunition. Roden Shipyards, for example, sells warp drive and astrometric skill upgrades, while Astral Mining offers mining upgrades. Weapons and ammunition offers correspond to the faction's spaceship preferences - Minmitar offer projectile weapons and ammo, Ammar offer laser weapons and crystals, and so on.

3. Pick a corporation with multiple agents in the region

Nearly every station has at least one agent, and there are many duplications in terms of standings and items offered for sale. So if you want to improve your standing with Gallente and you want to buy equipment to improve your mining, then Astral Mining is one of the corporations you would want to consider. Since there are many Astral Mining agents in Gallente space, choosing this corporation will not restrict your choice of star systems all that much.

Once you have a goal in mind, use the Agent Finder to narrow your choices of star system. Keep in mind that when you finish running level 1, you will almost certainly have to move to a new system to find a level 2 agent, and again for level 3 and 4. So try to find a group of level 1-2-3-4 agents that are fairly close together.

To avoid unfavorable missions such missions in low/null security space and missions that require you to kill empire ships you will need to decline missions every now and then. It is best to choose your location so that you have a second and even third agent as backup once you can't decline the mission offered from the first agent without losing standings.

4. Pick a base station and start running

Here is the map for that area: Verge vendor mission map.jpg

You need a base because as you go along, you will buy ships, ammunition and other gear and you will pick up loot and salvage from completed missions. It's easiest to keep all this stuff in one place, so plan to go to your agent's base to run missions, then fly back to your base when you need to resupply. It is often best to bring all the refit modules and extra ammo to the agent's station so you don't need to travel more than is needed.

Two hints for being sure your mission is complete

  • Look for a green check mark next to the mission
where the green checkmark appears
  • If you think the mission is finished but you don't see the green checkmark or want to check your objectives, click on the little down arrow next to the mission name and select "Details" from the menu. This will show you the mission briefing and you can take another look at your objectives.

Note that some missions may not get this completion mark.

Mission preparation and walkthroughs

Never fly what you cannot afford to lose applies to running missions as well. When starting, fly the cheapest ship that will do the job and only pay for expensive upgrades once you're sure you can replace them. Also, keep in mind that no activity is 100% safe, mission runners can get scanned down and ganked and even an empty transport ship can become a target for a bored ganker.

NPC's in missions tend to be very predictable in their setups. For example, Gallente and Serpentis use only Kinetic and Thermal damage against you and are most susceptible to Kinetic and Thermal damage themselves; when they use any form of EWAR, it's always sensor dampening. It helps quite a bit if you set up your ship to deal damage that NPCs are vulnerable to and defend against what they will throw at you. Check out NPC damage types for a full description and a handy chart that you can keep in your Neocom Notebook.

Notes

  1. ^ At least The Blood-Stained Stars does not.

References

  1. ^ https://oldforums.eveonline.com/?a=topic&threadID=795200 On the mission reward balancer
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