Science & Industry

This thread amuses me.

This char is now my miner - also my 'new' main char (sold my main a few years ago and recently came back) and i have an alt that i use for PVE / missions and picking up the cans from my miner.

I had a little 'play' last night in my local ore belt, with my Covetor, running 3 x T1 strips, 2 x mining upgrade II's (works out just under 2800M3 per cycle on all 3) and filling up my Miasmos. After a quick bit of math, i worked out that 3 hours of mining Veld (all 3 types) with my current set up, covers my 'cost' for the day* If i feel like it, i'll go and do a bit more but usually after that, i then switch to my alt and go pirate bashing or doing security missions for the dollar.

I mine whatever is convenient to me - usually what ever is in my sector - Highsec too, i might point out - purely for the reason that i can't be arsed with the upheaval of moving all my crap in to nullsec, because back when i played last time (around 4 years ago) miners used to spend a solid 80% of their time stuck in the stations in Null due to the fact that it wasn't safe - a bad investment.

From what i understand, Null is no longer as dangerous as it was but is it actually worth me moving there now, after all the posts about the prices crapping out ? Everyone is out to make money, the prices are totally wacked and in the end it'll be the miners that take the hit from it.



*my mining character's cost per day is worked out quite simply. The cost of a plex, divided by 30 (days) divided by 5 (hours) which then tells me what my miner needs to make in isk. (25M p/d - currently 3 full loads of Veld)

"Buy order -> compress -> sell" is a nifty little niche right now. The problem is getting the idiots in NPC Corps on board with "hey stupid, you're throwing ISK away" ... but they're set in their ways, and will never listen to anyone.

True, the rorq vs. Orca boosts do throw things off a bit ... but on the other hand, lowends are significantly smaller than the highends --> ABC is (IIRC) 16 m3/unit vs 0.1, 0.15, 0.3, 0.6, 1.2 for Veld, Scord, Plag, Pyrox/Omber, Kernite.

(NOTE -- numbers pulled from memory, I might be off).

Eh. There are large expanses of nullsec that are deserted. Back in the day you had to have dscan open all the time and be mindful of reds in-system, but these days I've gone for hours without seeing a single other soul in-system. If you find some dead system far off the usual transit routes, and are on good terms with the locals, it's about as safe as hisec.

The problem with mining out in null is, and has pretty much always been, logistics. It's hard for a small corp (or one person running an army of alts) to mine profitably out in null. You need a POS for staging, and that raises your profile in the area (someone *will* find it). If you're in sov null, you have to pay the owners for the privilege; if in NPC null, you're going to get bashed by bored roamers. And even after you collect your ore (and these days, compress it), you still have to sell it. It's easier now than it used to be due to jump-bridges and jump-freighters, but again: smaller corps may not have access to these things, and trying to take a blockade runner full of compressed ore into Jita for sale is a suicide mission. My strategy was to contract out my ore in null and have buyers come pick it up. I made less ISK than I would have made in high, but that assumes I could even *get* my ore into hisec to sell. (But mining for manufacturing purposes, while easier in some respects, has the opposite problem: you have to import lots of trit and pyerite and mexallon, which gives you the same difficulties in reverse.)

I quit living in null a long while back because, unless you're in a big corp/alliance, it's hard to live out there. (That's by design, by the way; I'm not complaining about it, it's just the way the game is.) Lowsec is a blast for shooting stuff, but it's hopeless as far as industry goes (although you can do PI there if you're careful). Trying to mine in lowsec is a lossmail waiting to happen.

Hisec mining is the best ISK/hr mining gig there is, especially with the recent changes to POS anchoring (no more standings requirements) and the introduction of the compression array (you can haul in a Miasmos instead of needing a freighter). Veldspar is still the best ISK/hr ore to mine, and it's abundant all over hisec space.

The mining mechanic is boring and dumb, but the mining profession (at least in hisec) has never been better or easier.

People keep saying that hisec mining is the best ISK/hr and that veldspar is the most profitable. Have any of you actually done the math? Every other ore except omber is more valuable than veldspar. If you're not a bad, you should park at a belt and just strip everything within range (except omber) for the most actual isk gained per played hour.

If you have a 100% perfect Hulk- all V's, t2 drones with 100% uptime, a 100% max orca booster and a hauler, you're making roughly 45 mil an hour mining pyroxeres (+10-20% if you sell compressed version). With that same hulk, veldspar is making roughly 36 mil an hour.

Just because "there is more" veldspar doesn't mean that it's more isk/hour- if you're cherry picking the veld and leaving everything else, you need to learn some math.




If only there were an in game mechanic to see the mining volume within a given system...hmmm

Null has exactly the same ores in the static belts in slightly larger quantities with the addition of the lucrative 'low sec' ores as well. So Null Static belts are always going to be more valuable than High static belts.
The industry anoms may not be based on ore prices. But Null will always win out on potential income. They just have to turn that potential into reality.

I was just looking at the Cerlestes ore table, and one thing jumped out at me: the nullsec ores have collapsed when compared against lowsec ores. And since almost nobody mines in lowsec, the value of lowsec ore is tied to the fact that it's comparatively rare compared to nullsec and hisec ores.

Consider this: as of this writing, Arkonor is barely better than straight Veld in terms of value. The spike in pyerite prices pushes scordite above even bistot in value. In fact, hisec ores in total are more valuable than nullsec ores, with lowsec ores being the most valuable of all (because almost no one is mining them -- supply and demand).

So think of all the dimensions of being profitable at mining. It's not just getting the ore into your hold; it's getting it to market in volume. Veld (and scord) win that battle by a mile. You can pick a system one jump away from any trade hub and mine all the veld and scord you want. And being only one hop away from a trade hub, you don't even have to mess around with hauling logistics.

Actually what you're trying to say is 'fix battleships, so nullsec uses them again' because the t2 doctrines used now use negligible amounts of high-ends. Nobody uses massed battlecruisers or battleships anymore (except the CFC with baltecs, but we don't lose those). Fleets of t2 or t3 ships getting welped don't matter until someone busts out a marauder doctrine. But really you'd want to incentivize massive capital fights again as those burn minerals like nobody's business. But those don't happen because supercaps.

Even so, that would not fix the ratio issue because if you managed to get t1 production high enough to make high-ends not glutted you'd have ran out of trit long ago.

Thank you for validating all of my previous comments about many highsec miners being bad at math.

Try actually running the numbers on isk/m3 on the highsec ores. Isogen is more valuable than Tritanium, but Omber absolutely sucks because it has a low portion of isogen compared to how much m3 it weighs. Do yourself a favor and download Dedaf's Industrial Tool listed in the S&I thread.

The most isk per hour for a highsec miner is to land at a belt and mine out everything except omber (preferably with a hauler and a booster). If you're solo mining, then cherry picking the Pyroxeres/Kernite/Scordite is the best income per hour (if it's at the belt you have access to).

I'm pretty sure there's a 15+ page thread on how compressed ore is more valuable than refining it, as well as refining the ore actually loses value.

As of a few days ago:

It's because of exactly what I (& others) predicted would happen and we got laughed at and told it never would.
Null Sec gets 20% more minerals out of the same amount of ore than Highsec (16% if we count a POS, but they have upkeep, an Outpost adds no upkeep to the already paid sov bill for the system).
Meaning Null Sec can quite simply strangle high sec by pricing them out of the market on ore.

However, there are still vast mineral stockpiles which account for most of the minerals currently on sale and more in the pool, which are now 'stuck' in highsec because Null doesn't want to take the loss (66% return btw, not 50% for Null also, unless I've gone crazy) compressing them via modules anymore. So those minerals suddenly have lower demand, only being of value to local producers, but will eventually run out, which will then result in a very sudden spike of mineral prices after the ore market has been strangled by Null for so long.

It's basic economics to predict these kind of effects, and it's also very basic economics to deal with things like ABC ores having a low value.