Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I am running lvl4 mining missions for Polygypsum. After my first mining cycle the graphic of the asteroid is overlaid with an explosion that is slightly larger than the origional asteroid is, and local space chat informs me with green text that "As a mining laser strikes, a massive explosion issues from the asteroid." Looking at the Info for Polygypsum it says "The rarest and most valuable ore in the known universe, Arkonor, has a less well known cousin called Polygypsum. While the two are very similar in chemical composition, the latter is quite unstable, having a tendency to ignite when handled roughly. While posing little danger to a spacecraft, which is built to withstand tremendous heat, this property makes the ore too dangerous under any other circumstances - such as in the business of refining."

Since this is allready in the game, I purpose a device made with Polygypsum, for the express purpose of focusing and enhancing the explosion that results from a ship being destroyed, either by taking fire or by use of the self destruct. It is a self-admitidly ultra rare ore, so it would be acordingly priced extremely high - and using more than one at once would make for a larger bang, and a few more un-mounted in the cargo hold to add their oomph as well. So as a suicide gank - the right ship can blow a nice large hole in somebodies fleet, or even cripple a space stations defences. Or a mining barge can score a kill during hulkaggeddon.

Nobody can deny the power of a van loaded with fertilizer and some TNT. A ship with a large capacitor, enhancers/boosters, can get their energy output quite high - especialy when there is very little drain on the system. And the only way I have found so far to get the ore is through a lvl4 mission, so that means getting the mission to mine the ore, mining all the ore, then dropping the mission to keep the ore, along with the resulting standing loss with the mining agent that comes with it.

Making these devices would be illegal in secure space, prohibitively expensive, and require great investment in the needed skills and equipment to mine it, refine it, assemble it, and even to install it - dont scratch the paint after instilation. But still able to be done. Cant trade them on the open market, concord kills you on sight if you are scanned with one aboard. And then there is the 1 in 100 chance it will explode during the manufacture process and consume your facility in the process - not recomended for planitary surface use.

This will probibly stay as a theoretical exercise, but it should be fun to bat around and see if it can be made into something useful.

EDIT:

Mission briefing

We've located some asteroids that contain substantial amounts of Polygypsum — that's a comparatively rare mineral, and almost completely unknown in this system. Our guys want to have a look at the stuff and see if they can figure out some way to make use of it; however, we don't have anyone who wants to deal with it. So guess who I thought of first?

You'll need to grab all 2,800 units of the stuff and get it back here. See you then.

This mission expires at 2011.12.30 19:27

Mother Lode Objectives Complete
The following objectives must be completed to finish the mission:

Bring Item Objective
Acquire these goods: Drop-off Location 0.8 Vylade IV - Moon 16 - Astral Mining Inc. Mineral Reserve
Item 2800 x Polygypsum (44800.0 m³)

Objective
Mine 2,800 units of Polygypsum for your agent. Location 0.8 Vylade

Rewards
The following rewards will be yours if you complete this mission: 727,000.00 ISK
4207 Loyalty Points.

Bonus Rewards
The following rewards will be awarded to you as a bonus if you complete the mission within 2 hours, and 40 minutes 929,000.00 ISK

Mining Polygypsum
Polygypsum is widely considered worthless because of the dangers associated with storing and refining it. As a result, you won't find this ore on the market. In fact, for this reason, most sensor manufacturers don't even bother putting it as a unique entry in the computers when they install standard ship scanners.

If you're having trouble finding the correct ore at the mission location, you can right-click the "Polygypsum" icon in your mission's Journal entry and select "Add to Overview."

I've always wondered myself why I can't load a freigther full of industrial explosives, then crash into an enemy carrier or something.

Who Knew?

I earned all my chips, up through lvl4, by doing mining missions and spending LP + mission income in the store. My lvl5 chips I bought with the proceeds from selling PLEX.

Thread moved from Science & Industry.