Science & Industry

Why it is looked down upon and what most here are trying to get across to you is this; AFK mining in an industrial cargo ship is like strapping Civilian Gatling guns to a battle cruiser then running around low/null sec looking for a fight. If you're going to do something, do it right.

When you're asking for advice get ready for criticism, especially in this game.

A retriever will mine in 51 minutes what your ship will mine in 283 minutes. Those numbers would basically be with no skills. you can probably shave an extra 10-15 minutes off of the retriever with skills and maybe 20-30 minutes off of your hauler.

Basically you can do anything in eve and make more isk in less amount of time than mining with a hauler.

And really, the time and effort you put into this post, you could have been mining with an actual mining ship and made more isk than if you had that hauler mining for a week straight.

Yes, I've been at that stage between mining frigates to the Retriever before, I understand. There's not really much options for a new player whose skill set is focused completely in mining, and is training up more mining - related skills.

If you already have a decent ISK reserve currently, it would be far more beneficial over the long term to use your Mammoth to run distribution missions and grind up standings for an NPC corp with a nearby station during your "active" times, instead of continuing to mine in the Osprey. That way you'll be better prepared to get into the business of refining your ores in future, once you start pulling them in larger amounts with your mining barge. Of course, one can never have too much ISK in his pocket, so just do what you enjoy doing really.

Good luck!

Yeah, I've been looking into refinining, and it looks like part of getting that illustrious 100% refine rate is getting that tax rate down to zero. I guess it's back to mission running haha. I can't thank you enough for all the help you've given me considering the amount of criticism I've been getting

Agreed. It doesn't take long to train up your industrial skill. (You don't even need a Mammoth, a Hoarder with some Cargo Expander can handle L4 distribution missions). And while you wait for your refining and mining skills to train up, you can grind out a 6.67 rep. Having Social IV and Connections IV goes a LONG way in helping your rep grind.

This is a disaster, think of it this way. You can make the SAME isk in less than one hour of actual gameplay with your pc hardware taking 1/5th of the strain, and your "virtual" assets being in near zero risk as opposed to sitting a belt waiting for a faction spawn to come by and blow you up in 10 shoots, yes even on highsec. if you want to have a life in business even inside a game you need to start learning what "Amortization" means.


ALSO, keep in mind the laser will NOT change roids automatically, it will empty the roid and then sit there doing nothing.


So in short you are matching this:

- Low risk to assets
- 100% chance of success
- Strain to hardware Amortized due to active gameplay

Against this:

- Moderate risk to assets
- A very real chance of failure and low or no return.
- Strain to hardware unacceptable if the mining stops or the asset is lost.

if you think this merits actual experimentation before you decide to give up on it, im seriously questioning your ability to survive on today’s world.


Edit: Yassavi brings another point, $$ on electricity.

Well, I've put my Mammoth through almost two weeks of over night runs and have made about 30-35m afk. Haven't lost a single Mammoth. Argue all you want, maybe I'm crazy, but I've got ISK in my wallet; Enough to pay for the loss of 5 or more fully fitted Mammoths and still have made a profit without having to be at the computer at all. It might not be much to most, but to me it's a decent percentage of my total income, especially since I haven't been actively mining much. My fit:

1x Miner I

4x Medium Shield Extender I's

1x Survey Scanner II

3x Medium Cargohold Optimization I's

Cargo Hold Capacity: 10,265.9 m3

Time to fill cargo: 185.9601 minutes

EVEUniverse Fitted Ship Price: 24.2m


The reason I've got expensive rigs on there instead of 3x Expanded Cargohold I's (to achieve nearly the same amount of cargo space) is because I also use it as my main hauler for when I actively mine. Fitted with 4x Expanded Cargohold II's along with the rigs, it has a Cargo Hold Capacity of about 27.5k, just enough to haul a full jet can in one trip. A mammoth fitted with 3x Expanded Cargohold I's instead of 3x Medium Cargohold Optimization I's runs you 3.74m in EVEUniverse. Actually, it'd probably be smart for me to buy and fit a 2nd Mammoth just for afk-mining so I don't run the risk of losing those rigs

Important points when AFK-Mining :

-You want to have about 9-11k m3 cargo space ( The largest veldspar asteroids that are still reasonably common to find in .5 sec systems contain around 90-110k veldspar) IMPORTANT NOTE: You can only mine ONE asteroid. Once its depleted, your miners stop till activated manually again, so find yourself a nice, fat one

-Wait for the rats to spawn in the belt. Usually they're already there though. You want to make sure you are able to perma-tank what ever is attacking you for 3 hours! In a scarcely populated system with many belts, other players are unlikely to come by and destroy this group of rats resulting in a new spawn.

Step-by-Step process:

1. Fit your ship! 1x Mining laser, able to tank, 9-11k cargo space.

2. Find a system! A scarcely populated system (less than 10 in local maybe?) with good amount of asteroid belts (5 or more)

3. Warp in and test your tank! It may take a few minutes before your shields stop going down, but once you get the hang of what rats do how much damage, you won't have to wait for your shields to stabilize if you know you can tank them.

4. Find a fat, juicy asteroid! Preferably one that can fill 9-11k m3 cargo hold space.

5. Fire up the lasers and go afk over night!

6. Wake up in the morning to a full cargo hold usually worth 3-5m! Take 5 minutes to check things out and dock into a station to unload your ore.

*6* Some precautions one may want to take.
-Align to a station or stargate and make sure your warp won't be disturbed in case you're in a hurry to warp out when you
come back to the keyboard!
-Orbit the asteroid if you're afraid some ******* will bump you out of laser range ( has never happened to me)


Thanks for all the constructive criticism and help guys! I've put a decent amount of work into this experiment, and have learned a lot as a result. I don't know, if it turns out I'm not crazy, I just might make a guide I really hope I've contributed to the community!

What else is there to discuss? Still doesnt change my opinion that it isnt worth it.

You did some AFK mining, made yourself 30-35 mil over almost 2 weeks? and so far nobody has been interested enough to pop you and clearly the rats arent able to kill you. If that amount of ISK, the wear and tear on your computer, and the slight increase to your electrical bill are all acceptable to you then GG. Personally i would have just powered off my PC and used the money saved to help pay for a PLEX.


In other news, my toon that only has level 3 PI skills trained made over 10 mil in tier 2 commodities production over the course of 2-3 days...back to you Minnoh.

I tried this when I was new to the game. Seemed like a good way to make some extra isk. I learned very quickly it was a big waste of time. in 0.5 belt rats will sometimes jam a mammoth causing you to lose lock and come back the next morning to a nearly empty cargo hold. Add to that the fact that even if you got a full cargo hold you could get the same ore in about 10 minutes ATK with a HULK. You are better off setting up a mining barge just long enough before down time that it will be full before the server goes down and auto logs you.
The risk of leaving a piloted ship out all night for only 2-3 mil isk is a total waste. You may not get popped but you won't make enough to be worth the risk. the lost skill points from not having at least +3 implants in you head is worth way more than the little bit of ore you could get. And if you have the implants and get podded it would take a lot longer to earn that isk back.
2-3 mil isk may seem like a lot to you now, but very soon that will be pocket change. Consider that most null sec BS size rats have 1-2 mil bounties and take seconds to kill, mining high sec ore with a mammoth with a single mining laser just does not make sense.

Mining in a indy is laughable at best, I know. Been there and done that.

You could have made more doing some small time trading before you logged off, buying low and selling high. You still made money AFK, you are safe(er) and your PC is not on 24/7.
You could have even (shocker incoming) got some basic manufacturing skills and made some items then sold them to make that extra income.


Personally I loathe leaving my $2,800's worth of pc on more than it has to be. Freak storms and power outages you know. Not to mention that sucker really draws the juice.

But, play how you want to play. Your money, your time.

To be honest, you could have bummed 30M in a day honestly.