Ships & Modules

The T1 PI ship, with mix of istabs and warpcorestabs and tank. Collect couple months worth of stuff to local station and call the redfrogs to move it out to jita/market. Unless you PI at superactive area your ship is mostly safe, just park it to the local station and fly there in shuttle/frig or somethin. Hope you have station in your PI system, also remember instaundock and instadock bookmarks.

Stabbed epithal with cov-ops scout. You cant escape bubble camp in nullsec in anything capable of hauling any reasonable amount of PI. In LS solo epithal should be fine. Of course if someone makes instalocking proteus you are ****** in any ship.

Stabbed epithal with 10MN mwd and cloak (mwd-cloak-uncloak-insta warp) might be also good.

I use an epithal with a mix of wcs and inertia stabs in the lows. A moderate shield tank and for rigs I use hyperspatial velocity optimizers (warp speed rigs), which will allow you to warp faster than T1 frigates and larger.

Edit: essentially only T2 frigates and dictors warp faster.

option A: A t1 transport with fast align time, 3/4 stabs and a buffer.

I use the Badger, its perfect for the job.

2 - 4 Stabs are a must imo.


However if you often have to go through gate camps (unlike me), you may want to seriously consider using a T2 indy with cov ops cloak instead.

Ofc there is the price difference, you should consider that as well.

Only briefly if you do it correctly, you can launch it up to the POCO while cloaked, set a course that only dips into range briefly, once into range decloak, grab the stuff, recloak and warp off. Shouldn't be an issue unless there are hostiles in system actively hunting you, and generally there won't be. You'll be decloaked for 10-20 seconds tops, which shouldn't be long enough for anyone to find you, unless they're already at your customs office. :)

As you might guess, my personal preference for Low-Sec PI runs is using a Blockade Runner (Prorator to be precise).

I've gone for an Epithal with shield buffer, a bunch of stabs in the lows and a prototype cloak. Gets me through camps I couldn't spot from star map stats, and should it blow up it's extremely cheap to replace.

Carrier... Should definitely use a carrier

I found a blockade runner to be the tool of choice. You can stay within transfer range of a POCO while still be cloaked, so for a transfer you will only be uncloaked for 1-2 seconds.

But above all, bookmarks are your friend: 150km+ away from stargates and the POCO to check for campers, around 5km away from the POCO to warp in cloaked and go within transfer range and at least one off-center savespot in the system where you can uncloak briefly for doing transfers between the POCO and the planet.

Also, if you don't mind the high maintenance and you're doing small volume production you can use your command center for launches and avoid the POCOs altogether.

Your most important asset is intel. Whatever ship you fly is completely secondary to knowing what is on the other side of a gate.
To this end, the map is your best friend. Look for ships active in system, kills, nearby events like Incursions, etc....Then scout ahead of your hauler. I used a stealth bomber to scout, reset my extractors, move the items to a POCO, etc before getting my hauler. Take the time to set up some safe spots, scan spots for the gates, etc...

Once in the hauler, all I had to do was run to the various POCO's in that system. I open the POCO interface while in warp so all I had to do was literally click and drag into/from my cargo the instant I dropped warp, then spam warp to my next spot.

I did my PI two jumps from high sec, and didn't need to cross much dangerous space to reach high sec markets- so I used a cheap Hoarder with little more than an MWD and cloak. Since I was only doing a couple toons' worth of PI on a single acct, I never had expensive enough cargo to warrant a shiny hauler. I was just prepared to lose a hauler and replace it rather than spend what little money I had on trying to isk-tank a few million worth of common market items.
(I speak in the past tense, but it's how I still do PI now in null sec, although since it's in my own sov I don't worry about scouting so much as I can call in the cavalry if I get tackled....still, I use a half-fitted mammoth that has lasted a year without being killed)

A cost analysis is needed for your individual situation. If you are just doing PI as a side hobby for a bit of passive income, then don't spend more on ships than the cargo is actually going to be worth. If you are running multiple accounts with a mountain of planet slots, then capacity and survivability might warrant a shiny hauler.

Also, remember that freight services exist to move stuff for you. Again, if you are moving a bunch of stuff and making real isk, adding a freight service to your overhead may be better than trying to move it yourself. Likewise, hit up corp-mates for help. It's not unlikely someone also has stuff to move and has room for your crap too. Or may scout for you if you haul their stuff. It's an MMO, make use of that.

The only thing more wide spread than Baggers poco empire is Baggers poco ambitions.