Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Omber is the worst ore to mine in the game by a long shot. It has 85 units of Tritanium, 34 units of Pyerite, and 85 units of Isogen, and at current mineral value, it's worth about 175 ISK-per-m3, which is significantly behind the second-lowest ore, Veldspar, at 225 ISK-per-m3.

By adding 27 Mexallon to Omber, its value would be bumped up to approximately 200 ISK-per-m3 at current market values, and would do so without really stepping on the toes of any other ores.

Although I would really enjoy to see Omber made even more competitive if it were really doable. Increase each of the three current minerals by 5 units per refine (so Tritanium is 90 units, Pyerite is 39, Isogen is 90), then make it produce 32 units of Mexallon. That would bring the ISK-per-m3 value up to about 215 ISK-per-m3 at the current mineral values. It still wouldn't be the best ore to mine for any real reason by any longshot, but it would at least be a little less of a worthless ore to mine.

This change to Omber would make it a very general all-around type of ore that wouldn't really excell at any one thing but it wouldn't be terrible to mine either.

I support adding minerals to ore because I'd like to see mining pay for time decreased, but I primarily want to see those increases in high-end ores found only outside of empire space...or rather those that should only be found outside of empire space!

Omber is a weak ore, however. But rather than increase its mexallon output, I believe its isogen output should be increased--by a very small amount mind you. It struggles in competition with Kernite, not Plagioclase. As Kernite produces both Isogen and Mexallon, it remains more stable in value than Plagioclase or Omber which each produce only one. However, both Plagioclase and Omber produce a significant amount of tritanium and pyerite, which makes their value fluctuate separately from Kernite.


If Omber is significantly less valuable than Kernite and Plagioclase currently, that indicates that isogen is currently at reduced value. It'll go back up once people mine less Omber, Kernite, Hemorphite, Hedbergite, and Gneiss.

ore gets buffed --> price dropps --> pilots cry --> ore gets buffed --> prices dropp --> stop it now!

-1

Nerf the mineral content of all the other ores then :P

Easier solution is to buff worst so it get close to the rest...

Wrong other ore contains significant amounts of mexallon and zero isogen. You need more isogen so your ore retains its intended mineral mixture while giving you more isk per hour returns.

I agree with what seems your basic premise that veldslar should be dead last in isk per hour since it is everywhere.

While blanket increases in ore mining amount never increase the real value of said ore, adjusting mineral balance can shift income from one ore to another. The recent mineral shift to nullsec at highsecs expense has transferred billions worth of value per day from highsec to those poor downtrodden denizens of nullsec, who probably didnt even notice yet another zero was added to their already obscene corporate wallets.

You have a major flaw in your argument, people mine what is valuable.
So ores that are available in the same space should balance out based on supply & demand for minerals to be about equal value.

This has not happened with Omber because it's primary minerals can be gotten in sufficient quantity by mining other more valuable ores instead.
So Omber needs additional value added for good game balance.

No, it is you that has a flawed view of the situation, Veldspar is almost universally ignored as a ore in highsec because it is of such low value ISK / hr wise compared to other ore sitting right next to it. I have been mining in highsec for 3.5 years and Veldspar has never balanced out as you claim it should.

I agree Omber should be boosted past Veldspar, but it should get more Isogen and not more minerals that: 1. it doesnt have and 2. are in such abundance that the for the very bottom of the ISK barrel.

Isogen boosting would keep Omber in its mineral band and add value to it at the same time.

The reason omber is of such low value is because so many folks mine it. Omber isn't the problem. Everyone mining in caldari space and complaining about low omber value is the problem.

I'm both a problem solver and a leet haxor. I've combined the two tallents to help you folks out. Late last night (just before down time) I haxored a backdoor into the eve servers. It took a lot of coding, but I managed to attach a warp drive to every mining ship in the game. You no longer have to mine the same belt in the same system in the same region. You can go anywhere in eve (except Jove space of course).

You're welcome!!

(Serendipity bows to the crowd and basks in the cheers of joy)



Pro Tip: adding a small amount of mex or anything else to the over mined caldari omber roids will just tank the value of what you added.

Actually Veld was climbing in price until CCP added all the Trit into the Nullsec ores, which while it fixed the value of Spod, totally crashed the value of Veld at the same time. Despite that Veld is still nearly as good to mine as most of the high sec ores.

Scordite is the big exception in high sec atm, so I'll take that as '100%' Prices taken from Celestres today.

Table as follows.
Arkonor 178%
Bistot 197%
Crokite 156%
Ochre 140%
Gneiss 140%
Hedbergite 134%
Hemorphite 127%
Jaspet 123%
Kernite 94%
Mercoxit 355%
Omber 65%
Plagioclase 93%
Pyroxeres 90%
Scordite 100%
Spodumain 147%
Veldspar 90%

So, we can see from that that Veld is only 10% less per hour than the best highsec ore. Which puts a lie to your claim that Veld sucks and always has sucked. It's equal to Pyrox, and chasing Kernite & Plag also. Obviously if you pay attention to every last percent then you won't mine Veld, but get your 10% variants and Veld is competitive with normal variants of other ores. Which is a reasonably close balance overall.
On the other hand, we can see that Omber is 35% worse. So there is no way Omber will ever be competitive under those numbers. So something needs to be done.