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Things you wish you knew before your first POS?
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Elijah Sokarad
Slate Group
#1 - 2013-05-18 19:13:41 UTC
I'm starting to gather the materials for my first POS. I need to gain appropriate standings while stockpiling fuel, so it will be a while before I actually start the POS. Ultimately, I plan to use the station to provide trade goods for my trading and industry alts.

Given that I have some time before launch, I would like feedback on things that bit individuals in the behind when starting their POS. Essentially, trying to learn from other's mistakes.

thanks
Termy Rockling
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#2 - 2013-05-18 19:56:47 UTC
No offense but from the description of your POS use it almost feels like you dont know whats the use of one even is.
They are mostly used as research stations and sometimes for production.
Haulie Berry
#3 - 2013-05-18 20:44:57 UTC
Elijah Sokarad wrote:
I'm starting to gather the materials for my first POS. I need to gain appropriate standings while stockpiling fuel, so it will be a while before I actually start the POS. Ultimately, I plan to use the station to provide trade goods for my trading and industry alts.

Given that I have some time before launch, I would like feedback on things that bit individuals in the behind when starting their POS. Essentially, trying to learn from other's mistakes.

thanks


You're using it for... what?

This plan does not sound like it is going places. Stockpiling fuel? Ugh What's to stockpile? You buy some fuel in a hub and then you deliver it (or have it delivered) to your tower.
Aria Ning
White Rabbit Industries
#4 - 2013-05-18 22:01:29 UTC
Elijah Sokarad wrote:
I'm starting to gather the materials for my first POS. I need to gain appropriate standings while stockpiling fuel, so it will be a while before I actually start the POS. Ultimately, I plan to use the station to provide trade goods for my trading and industry alts.

Given that I have some time before launch, I would like feedback on things that bit individuals in the behind when starting their POS. Essentially, trying to learn from other's mistakes.

thanks


If you want to trade items between alts just make a private items exchange contract. Otherwise your POS intention will just be a waste of isk.
Ginger Barbarella
#5 - 2013-05-18 23:10:54 UTC
1. Throw it up outside normal trade/mission hubs/routes to discourage the losers that wardec new corps just to kill their towers.
2. Throw up a large with lots of ECM ("d!ckstar") to discourage the losers that wardec new corps just to kill their towers.
3. To save some isk (if you're so inclined) take advantage of PI to generate the necessary fuel components if you'll be building your own fuel blocks; multiple accounts, multiple toon with PI & Indy skills up to L4. I'd suggest the ice mining thing, but that's just too damned boring for me to suggest. P

If you're not ready to commit the time and isk, remember that you can take advantage of very short wait lines for ME/PE/Copying by using low sec stations. Just train up a CovOps or Blockade Runner toon to get off-gates quickly, and make sure to set up insta-undocks at the stations you do use.

"Blow it all on Quafe and strippers." --- Sorlac
Huttan Funaila
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#6 - 2013-05-18 23:18:52 UTC
Elijah Sokarad wrote:
Given that I have some time before launch, I would like feedback on things that bit individuals in the behind when starting their POS. Essentially, trying to learn from other's mistakes.

Setting permissions in a POS takes about 16 billion clicks. You will do it wrong. A lot.

It will take you all weekend to set up your POS. Stuff will not be in nice neat rows no matter how much you curse and scream at your computer. Have a sense of humor, but maybe not this one. Ammo for your POS guns will be 1 size larger than what the array says. So your small blaster array needs medium hybrid ammo. You may use faction ammo in the array. Missile batteries are useless for your POS.

Decide if you are going to take down your POS if wardecked or leave it up. If you plan to dismantle it, then don't stick too many offensive arrays up. Leave a few haulers in an NPC station in the system to help take down the tower and stuff. ECM and hardeners should suffice. Search the forums for "dickstar". If you are sticking a POS up in highsec for research, you'll go with Caldari because labs need CPU and the Caldari towers have the most available.

Refiining arrays are a complete and total waste of pixels. You will use them once. Any mining barge can mine faster than a refining array can refine, and the waste is so bad it is worth heading as many jumps as needed to get to the nearest NPC station with refining (or Minmatar outpost if in nullsec). 3 hours to refine 200k m3? Really?

POS planner:
http://eve.1019.net/pos/index.php

Practice with a number of setups to see what you can do with your tower.

Some reading:
https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=38978
older version:
http://oldforums.eveonline.com/?a=topic&threadID=817184

Know what your arrays are capable of making:
http://games.chruker.dk/eve_online/inventory.php?group_id=397

A small ship assembly array can make T1 frigates and destroyers. If you want to make T2 ships, you need the "advanced" ones.

You have to be in 0.3 or lower space to engage in moon mining or the reactions to make thinks from moon goo.

If you have labs at a POS, always rent an office in the same system and do the research out of the NPC station. Leave no BPO in the POS. Failure to rent an office means that all your BPO are in the POS and it is now a loot piñata - people will wardec you just to see what loot drops.

Stay out of local chat in the system your POS is in. Smack talk frequently gets rewarded by a notice from CONCORD about a new shiny wardec.
Lyza Kimbo
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#7 - 2013-05-19 00:20:21 UTC
Don't forget to set a PW on the shield.

Be aware that your chances of finding an open moon spot for a hi-sec POS are slim to none, and Slim left town. There are tons of powered-down POS anchored at moons in 0.5 systems, and you'll likely have to wardec one of those and blow it up to claim a spot. Alternatively, you can look to buy one. I paid about 150M ISK some two years ago.

Be aware that the +5 standing your corp needs with Caldari State in order to anchor a POS at a moon in a 0.5 system is natural standing, before the bonus from Connections. The standing of your corp is the average of the standings of those members who have a non-zero standing (whew!), but it takes a few days to catch up. The standing of a brand new corp can take a week or more to reach 5.0, even if your character had a 5.0 standing when you made the corp.

Good luck figuring all this out, it's freaking complicated :)
Elijah Sokarad
Slate Group
#8 - 2013-05-19 01:51:22 UTC
Thanks for all the replies. In reading my original post, I realize that I was not really clear about my intentions. I had planned to do ME/PE research, and later copying my blueprints for sale. Also, I hoped to centralize my industrial production given a recent shortage of manufacturing slots nearby. My comments about stockpiling fuel relate to making the fuel block parts via PI production, coupled with the ice I have saved. (Gotta keep those alts productive). I would rather have some fuel stockpiled before the Odyssey changes.

I had not realized that manufacturing POS slots were so specialized - the POS planner really helps. I will have to rethink the production part of the plan.

A few additional questions:
-The small ship array description mentions a ship maintenance array. I'm unclear on what role the ship maintenance array plays in building ships, if any.

-I would be planning to take the POS down if wardecced. As far as defenses, filling the weak spots on shield resists, plus maintaining a healthy store of Stront seemed reasonable precautions. In such a case, would ECM or guns really make a difference?
Huttan Funaila
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#9 - 2013-05-19 02:37:58 UTC
Elijah Sokarad wrote:
-The small ship array description mentions a ship maintenance array. I'm unclear on what role the ship maintenance array plays in building ships, if any.

-I would be planning to take the POS down if wardecced. As far as defenses, filling the weak spots on shield resists, plus maintaining a healthy store of Stront seemed reasonable precautions. In such a case, would ECM or guns really make a difference?

When you deliver the job, the stuff needs some place to go. Ships go into ship hangers, so you need the ship maintenance array for that. Coming with the new expansion is the ability to anchor capital ship maintenance arrays anywhere. You still cannot anchor the array to build them outside of sovereign nullsec.

My advice is to always have some ECM and guns online. Part of the point of a dickstar is to make things as miserable as possible for the attackers. If you are onlining ECM arrays every time the attackers blow one up, many of them will just decide to go to bed and let the wardec expire. You are not the biggest **** in the game, you never will be. You want your POS to be a cheese-grater that will make them cry.

You might have a computer problem, or be away for the weekend, so you can't take the tower down in time. A small tower can't defend itself out of a wet paper bag. A medium tower can mount enough defenses to make attackers go "meh, i need more booze" and decide to go do something else. A large tower in highsec takes like 10 hours to beat down into reinforcement (in low/null, a single dreadnaught might take a whole hour to do the same).

0.5 systems are very crowded, especially in Caldari space. I'd either go for 0.6 or 0.7 to avoid the crowds. You can't anchor in 0.8. It is possible to get your character to that standing level by yourself.
RubyPorto
RubysRhymes
#10 - 2013-05-19 03:52:23 UTC
Huttan Funaila wrote:
Elijah Sokarad wrote:
-The small ship array description mentions a ship maintenance array. I'm unclear on what role the ship maintenance array plays in building ships, if any.

-I would be planning to take the POS down if wardecced. As far as defenses, filling the weak spots on shield resists, plus maintaining a healthy store of Stront seemed reasonable precautions. In such a case, would ECM or guns really make a difference?

When you deliver the job, the stuff needs some place to go. Ships go into ship hangers, so you need the ship maintenance array for that. Coming with the new expansion is the ability to anchor capital ship maintenance arrays anywhere. You still cannot anchor the array to build them outside of sovereign nullsec.



You only need an SMA if the ship in question is too large to fit into the cargohold of the ship you're flying (caps). Otherwise, you can just drag it to your cargo and haul it to station, no SMA required.

"It's easy to speak for the silent majority. They rarely object to what you put into their mouths." -Abrazzar "the risk of having your day ruined by other people is the cornerstone with which EVE was built" -CCP Solomon
Emma Royd
Maddled Gommerils
#11 - 2013-05-19 06:33:39 UTC
Lyza Kimbo wrote:
Don't forget to set a PW on the shield.

Be aware that your chances of finding an open moon spot for a hi-sec POS are slim to none, and Slim left town. There are tons of powered-down POS anchored at moons in 0.5 systems, and you'll likely have to wardec one of those and blow it up to claim a spot. Alternatively, you can look to buy one. I paid about 150M ISK some two years ago.



There are moons out there, but you will have to be prepared to travel 7+ jumps from the trade hubs. I'm about 9 jumps from jita and there are a few moons free, and to be honest, the difference between hauling a freighter 7 jumps or 9 jumps isn't that much Blink

Don't forget you want an station with available offices at a reasonable price. Any with L4 agents, manufacturing etc are going to be fairly pricey, It sounds like you're going to be a solo venture so you could always have your manufacturing base in a different station than your corp office, it's a bit of a pain moving minerals between characters, but could save you a fair bit of isk, which when you're starting off is a bonus.

Never ever ever research your bpo's by hauling them to a lab, keep them in a corp hangar and use the labs remotely, you'll need the skill "Scientific Networking" to 1 to be able to use a lab remotely.

Go into it with your eyes wide open, POS's are isk sinks if they're not used much
Elena Thiesant
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#12 - 2013-05-19 09:28:10 UTC  |  Edited by: Elena Thiesant
Emma Royd wrote:
Lyza Kimbo wrote:
Don't forget to set a PW on the shield.

Be aware that your chances of finding an open moon spot for a hi-sec POS are slim to none, and Slim left town. There are tons of powered-down POS anchored at moons in 0.5 systems, and you'll likely have to wardec one of those and blow it up to claim a spot. Alternatively, you can look to buy one. I paid about 150M ISK some two years ago.



There are moons out there, but you will have to be prepared to travel 7+ jumps from the trade hubs. I'm about 9 jumps from jita and there are a few moons free, and to be honest, the difference between hauling a freighter 7 jumps or 9 jumps isn't that much Blink


Also consider trade hubs other than Jita.

A few months ago I surveyed a couple of systems around 5 jumps from Dodixie, found a few open moons in each one.
Ginger Barbarella
#13 - 2013-05-19 16:21:50 UTC
Elena Thiesant wrote:
Also consider trade hubs other than Jita.

A few months ago I surveyed a couple of systems around 5 jumps from Dodixie, found a few open moons in each one.


This, definately. I've been doing a LOT more business in Dodixie in the last 6 months compared to Jita, *including* plex trading. Buying is just better in Dodixie; for selling, tho, I don't sell in trade hubs. Horribly low prices lead to very shallow wallet gains. Smile

As I mentioned already, get away from the trade and mission hubs; the benefits far outweigh staying close to one (including getting better prices on stuff you're selling).

"Blow it all on Quafe and strippers." --- Sorlac
Victoria Sin
Doomheim
#14 - 2013-05-19 16:47:03 UTC
Most important thing I learned was to match the POS to what you want to do with it. A large is expensive to run, so you need to put a lot of business through it in order to make it profitable. A small is too small imho, unless you just want to tickle a few invention jobs. A medium is just right for a small time manufacturer.
Lyza Kimbo
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#15 - 2013-05-19 21:33:48 UTC
Victoria Sin wrote:
Most important thing I learned was to match the POS to what you want to do with it. A large is expensive to run, so you need to put a lot of business through it in order to make it profitable. A small is too small imho, unless you just want to tickle a few invention jobs. A medium is just right for a small time manufacturer.


Yes, that's true. And the poster above who colorfully disparaged the defensive capabilities of a small POS had a valid point, as well.

But do not forget that a medium POS burns double the fuel of a small one, and going to a large doubles that again. The cost of the effing fuel is 98% of the financial burden of a POS.
Lord Battlestar
CALIMA COLLABORATIVE
Atrox Urbanis Respublique Abundatia
#16 - 2013-05-20 01:51:43 UTC  |  Edited by: Lord Battlestar
Victoria Sin wrote:
Most important thing I learned was to match the POS to what you want to do with it. A large is expensive to run, so you need to put a lot of business through it in order to make it profitable. A small is too small imho, unless you just want to tickle a few invention jobs. A medium is just right for a small time manufacturer.


True, though a small caldari POS can be useful if you mix it with public slots. As it is the only small tower than can have 3 online labs at once. So if you do your building and invention in station, you may be able to get away with it. However, if you want to do most of all of your jobs at the POS, you will have to do a medium.

Larges are only useful if you had a friend like I had who had enough characters to fill up the labs of at least 2 large Dread Guristas towers lol. Or you are partnering with multiple people. But then again my friend isn't playing anymore because of that workload lol.

Personally I have never ran anything more than a small tower on my own, I never had a big enough system to do it any other way.

I once podded myself by blowing a huge fart.
Eric Raeder
No Fee Too High
#17 - 2013-05-20 07:11:58 UTC
My biggest hassle setting up my first research POS was not understanding how corp standings work. I set up a private corp to run the POS, with initially just one character in it, said character having the 5.0 faction standings I needed. But I was silly enough to wait until the day I intended to launch the POS to set up the corp. Don't do that. Once created, a new corp goes through 7 days of "standings limbo" with all standings locked at zero regardless of what the member standings are. Only after 7 days do the corp standings get figured from average member standings. In my case it took longer than that, because after 7 days the corp faction standings weren't displaying properly, and I wound up petitioning the issue, waiting 3 more days for the rather embarrassing GM reply "clear your cache" (which I should have done before petitioning, duh). I was finally able to launch my tower, 10 days behind schedule.

Once your tower is anchored, you don't need standings just to online it or keep it anchored, so you can add low standings characters to the owning corp or let the high standing character leave. And characters with NO standings at all to the owning faction do not count for corp standings. But if you ever have to take down the tower, to swap it for a different one or move to another moon or keep it safe from a wardec, you'll have to go through the whole rigamarole of establishing corp standings again.
Caldari 5
D.I.L.L.I.G.A.F. S.A.S
Affirmative.
#18 - 2013-05-20 07:37:59 UTC
Eric Raeder wrote:
My biggest hassle setting up my first research POS was not understanding how corp standings work. I set up a private corp to run the POS, with initially just one character in it, said character having the 5.0 faction standings I needed. But I was silly enough to wait until the day I intended to launch the POS to set up the corp. Don't do that. Once created, a new corp goes through 7 days of "standings limbo" with all standings locked at zero regardless of what the member standings are. Only after 7 days do the corp standings get figured from average member standings. In my case it took longer than that, because after 7 days the corp faction standings weren't displaying properly, and I wound up petitioning the issue, waiting 3 more days for the rather embarrassing GM reply "clear your cache" (which I should have done before petitioning, duh). I was finally able to launch my tower, 10 days behind schedule.

Once your tower is anchored, you don't need standings just to online it or keep it anchored, so you can add low standings characters to the owning corp or let the high standing character leave. And characters with NO standings at all to the owning faction do not count for corp standings. But if you ever have to take down the tower, to swap it for a different one or move to another moon or keep it safe from a wardec, you'll have to go through the whole rigamarole of establishing corp standings again.

That being said, when you have to put up/change the tower with an existing corp is easier, because standings are calculated at DT based on the Characters that have been in the corp for longer than 7 days. High standings characters stay in the corp, kick everyone else, wait till DT, put up new tower, re-invite everyone.
Quinzel Nikulainen
Kokako Acquisitions
#19 - 2013-05-20 14:25:33 UTC
It's pretty funny how antiquated the 'Standings for POS' system is in High Sec.

Nobody enjoys grinding Standings and people only do it when they have specific goals in mind.

Why isn't the Standing requirement limited to the character anchoring the Tower?

As it is that may as well be the case due to the 'kick everyone, re-invite' fix which has been repeated thousands of times on these Forums.

Given how widespread that loophole is, which serves no purpose but to inconvenience people and make Employment Histories look ugly, you would think they would do away with it entirely.

Seems like a design artifact.

Ex-Kaalakiota citizen. Ex-Hyasyoda citizen. CEO of KŌKAK, a Nugoeihuvi affiliate corporation.
Iosue
League of Gentlemen
The Initiative.
#20 - 2013-05-20 14:38:08 UTC
Elijah Sokarad wrote:
I would be planning to take the POS down if wardecced. As far as defenses, filling the weak spots on shield resists, plus maintaining a healthy store of Stront seemed reasonable precautions. In such a case, would ECM or guns really make a difference?


imo, the key to your POS setup is location. don't try to locate a space within 7 jumps of jita, look in the 7-12 jump range if that's your main trade hub. reason being, any closer and you're prone to wardecs from others wanting that space. once you get a little ways out, people won't screw with deccing you, cause if they're gonna go through the effort to dec someone, they'll want something closer.

i suggest using a small caldari tower with no defenses. if someone decs you, you'll have 24 hours to reinforce the tower with defenses. you might also elect to replace the small with a large and really make them suffer. or you could just pack up and move. it's up to you, but you don't really need to spend any isk or time for defenses in hi sec, assuming you're not already at war. proper location is a better deterrent than defenses. if you've chosen a sufficiently far system, no one will bother you (so long as your not being an arse). also ensure you have access to a station with open offices, you'll want to setup an office so you can remotely run your research from the station, while only having the labs at the POS.
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