Missions & Complexes

A week old character with an imicus can make a decent living on radar sites, for his sp level at least. Define "no real reward," and provide me with some more details on your skill training and you'll have a better chance at helpful advice.

I'm currently training navigation/gunnery/shield/cap and cpu to lvl 3 should start leveling to 4 by the end of next week. The long term plan to fly a sabre by the end of August and some decent pvp with frigs within a few weeks (hopefully). I've been trying to learn as much as I can about the game and it's ship. But getting money to fund my pvp will be a challenge since I like to PvP a

No real rewards mean nothing worth taking other than the odd meta 4 drops. I managed to get a couple of faction mods but they have been few and far between. Although I've gotten enough for some good implants and for my skillbooks and a ok rifter fit. But if I want to go PvP I need to cover my costs.

They're not taking over null or WHs because being in highsec means they don't have to pay constant attention to their surroundings, and the loot is barely worse in exchange for exponentially less risk. As for rewarding, whether you're a one day old character or a 5 year old vet, you're going to have strings of exploration sites where you get absolutely no loot before you get that jackpot drop.

If you're flying frigs/dessies in highsec, I'd recommend Radars, Hideouts, Lookouts, and the DED 2/10 and, depending on your skills, maybe DED 3/10. I'd ignore any and all drone sites, Magnetometric sites, DED 4/10s for the time being, Gravimetric and Wormholes.

You can try running the static DED 1/10 and 2/10s that appear on overview, but personally I find these always camped and not worth the effort of fighting over. I'd ignore cosmic anomalies as they chance of faction loot is much lower than "proper" exploration and the bounties are terrible (unlike the null ones, where you get good bounties + chance of getting faction spawn/escalation).

I'd hazard a guess and say you'll pull in on average 8 to 10m per Radar site in the long run. For the combat sites you could be getting anywhere from 0 to 100m+ per site. Your possible drops are frigate type C-type, B-type and A-type modules, faction modules, and frigate BPCs.

List of rat frigate prefixes
e.g. You might get a Centii B-type Small Armor Repairer from a Sansha DED 2/10, or a Pithi A-type Small Shield Booster from a Gurista DED 3/10.

List of DED sites per faction: http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/DED_Complex_List

It's important to pick your region you're in carefully, taking into account what damage types your ship can do, what it's naturally good at tanking, and what EWAR the rats use. For example, laser boats aren't as great in Angel space because they can only do EM/Therm damage which Angel rats aren't weak against, while you'd rather want to use missiles than guns versus Sansha because they use Tracking Disruptors.

Also, if you don't like having the site you're in interrupted by other players, I'd suggest staying out of Caldari space because you will have people in billion dollar ships blitzing past you and grabbing the loot you're after. It really is that crowded.

Remember, and as most of the vets will tell you, there's no point trying to think of exploration in ISK/hr.

A table of exploration sites in highsec: http://www.swiftandbitter.com/eve/dsp/highsec.html

Lastly, I'll link http://explorationalmanac.blogspot.com/. It was written quite a while ago, but most of it is still relevant, especially to newer players.

Finding sites for the new explorer

Hello, i hope i can give you some impressions

I am explorer, living the locust-life, letting drift myself from system to system, and when i started, i had the same problem like you. I was located in Yarebap, which then was very very populated because of the proximity to Amarr and the availability of l3/l4/Storyline agents in the sorrounding systems. I barely found something. So i started to let myself be driven farther and farther away from my base, which brought up an enormous amount of new, not foreseen problems to me

Ship swapping, bay capacity and long time from finding a system far away (12-20 jumps) and be back in time to harvest the treasures, and ship size restrictions to the first pocket. From that point on i had a decision to make between the options

1.) Fitting one ship, to hit all opportunities. There arent many ships, that could fit into that scheme of having an exploration ship, with which i could also tank the hardest complexes, by still having the equipment onboard to harvest MAGs and RADs. Or take all the equipment with me, to refit in stations

2.) Having a transport/logistic ship in my fleet. This would solve some problems like tanking and equipment transport but also brings up the problem, that i lack capacity of bays and increases the risk of loosing expensive ships. But i would gain an independence enabling me, to fly far out without needing a station. Considering that, the problem of too few storage for ammo and loot became huge

3.) Leaving everything as it is, and take all opportunities in a range of 10 systems around my base. Which also means i could do more than just exploration

While thinking that over, i ended up in defining my ideal solution

I wanted following

• More Exploration sites, less missions
• Stable income out of exploration, which meant more sites to find
• Being able to stay far out for a long time without having to come back often for ammo and refitting.

i ended up in an Orca, carrying T2 Frigs (Assault, Bomber, Salvage). Also having - depending on my plans - a T2 Logistic and a T2 HAC in tummy, but also being able to swap this to mining vessels (Hulk and 1 smaller ORE vessel). With this combination i am able to swap ships in space (400Km³ ship hangar), refit in space (Orca offers refitting), also having 50Km³ bay for ore, and 100K+m³ for loot, salvage, equipment etc

Of course i use 2 toons

With that combination i choose the regions i fly to by following:

• The less people, the more treasures
• The less stations, the less people
• The farther out, the less stations
• The closer to low or null sec, the better the treasures
• Systems should not have stations in neighborhood.
• Systems should be out 20-30 jumps.
• Systems should not be in a trading lane (nullsec to lowsec to highsec to trading hubs for example).
• Systems should not be in faction war space.
• Systems should not have cosmos or epic arc series in proximity.
• Systems should not have l4 or l5 agents in proximity
• Systems should have single pocket low sec systems in proximity

If you go for treasures consider the following:

• The more players online (weekend) the bigger the number of sites spawning
• The less players online (CET early morning, during week and weekends) the bigger the chance to find treasures
• Numbers of players are often influenced by bank holidays, release of new online games and such. Always count those things in
• Same for prices at the trading hubs - new online game released (like SWTOR) influences the market for at least 4-6 month upward

Do's and Dont's

• Never sell far out. Never buy far out. U will loose a lot.
• Sum up the value of your orca. If it is higher, than what you consider healthy when flying into WH or lowsec/nullsec - go sell
• Follow all signatures always. Even if first response is 10% or higher - it might has treasures of high value
• Always have a safespot close to center and let the orca cloak. Invisibility is safety
• Always put out drones and after first scan cloak. Invisibility is safety
• Always scout systems especially when changing to low sec
• Always check for vessels when entering a wormhole
• Never speak to anyone in lowsec . u will only find pirates and players wanting to pewpew. Not worth the time at all
• Always try to contact SOV-Corps personell when in nullsec and chit chat. Nullsec are good people
• Never ever trust anyone. PVP costs cash - exploration brings cash - u need to be a professional in AVOIDING PVP
• PVP is not a matter of skill - only numbers. A single easy frig might be the bait for especially you. DONT FIGHT
• In low or null sec NEVER go for anomalities - pirates always look there first or wait there cloaked for especially you
• When entering a WH always INFO, then check the EVELOPEDIA, then send in exploration ship, then the rest
• When leaving a WH always INFO, then check WEB for podkills, then send out everything, the last ship leaving is the explorer
• Never stay in WHSpace until your WH collpases. It is more safe to return to what you know, than into something u dont know
• If you are in doubt about a situation, dont go - that saves ships
• Information and intelligence are your best friends. always check the 360° scanner when in complexes in low or null sec

I hope this helps a bit

Cheers

I agree. Exploration is more less like "..being the captain of a fish trawler ..". Some days are quite annoying, when u dont find anything interesting, some days are quite exciting. But prepare: Once u open a can in some MAG and find items worth 200 millions it might be kind of addicting to you. This is the reson that drives u back there.

For point 2 i can say, that this might be some issue we should adress to the devs or the csm: Drones and their loot. Without a bounty, crappy salvage beside 2 or 3 items but a ton of space reducing low cost items, the drones are the most odd stuff in Eve Online. The situation should be considered for a major change to drones. The only drones worth a bit of fun are the Sleepers. But those are far out of reach for 80 to 90 % of all players.

For point 3 - once u have passed the first pocket with ideally 40-100km to the next gate u dont need a scout or a second monitor. The best thing u can do is: Map one of you additional mousebuttons with any tool of choice to the "scan now" option of the 360° scanner and set time intervall to 7-10 secs. Set your filter to "ships only" and set the distance according to the distance travelled by tghe gates u passed (10K km to 100K km under normal circumstances). A ship that appears there is on the way to you. Dont wait and bring the transporter into warp immediatly and warp with fighting vessel immediatly after transporter has passed. My Orca is in warp lowest 15 sec, max 30 sec. No danger, no risk, no loss.

Little story:
2 weeks ago i found a WH leading to nullsec and brought both ships in. I was spitted out in the drone region. I fought for like 1 hr at an anomaly site and took away 2500-3000 m³ drone loot (Plush Compount, Glossy Compound..) which i still have in my tummy. I left the region since i got the feeling, it wasnt worth the time fighting there. The system was a -0.5 and still no t2 salvage. Compared to the fight on a sleeper site in a C2 WH space which took me like 20 mins, i got out about 4 times the amount from 20 sleeper drones in comparison to 65 drones inclujding 20 BS ship size drones. The risk to my HAC was higher from the sleepers while i tanked 8 BS ship size drones in nullsec without coming into anything lower than 92% armor.

Cheers

I'ts all about preparation. Same goes for high-sec.

First D-Scan, D-scan, D-scan.

Never try anything outside High-sec without it.

Here are a couple of hints/tips that will help you running sites in low sec, some apply to Wormholes as well.

-Seek out a relatively quiet system for exploration.
-Check out the info on everyone entering the system (Sec status high the lower the chance they'll going to kill you)
-Make sure Probes show on your d-Scan if someone is probing they trying to find you or a site (possible threat)
- when there is a possible thread keep alliegned to a friendly safe spot
- If you're on your own don't be greedy, unless it's particulary quite stay with fast in and out sites (Mach/Radar)
- Don't be a hero, better to run away and fight an other day

keep this in mind and you'll get the hang of being able to take a little bit risk more everytime, untill someone puts you with 2 feet on the ground again. I which case you have found your limit.

Wonderful post, thanks!

I was wondering though if I can use an orca to carry around exploration ship on the same character? Like, fly the orca with my all-in-one exploring ship in it's hold and basically use the orca as a container for loot and place to keep equipment swaps like diffirent subsystems, hardeners, and ammo? If that is possible, how many cruisers can I fit in the hanger?

just out of curiosity: is a pimped-out wolf with near perfect skills good enough for hisec exploration? if not, which sites should i avoid?

Thanks for all the replies, some really usefulalthough I don't think I'll be flying an Orca or dual boxing this year. :)

Maybe some rules for the explorers, looking for lowsec adventures, but are unsure how dangerous it is.

Only an empty lowsec system with you only, is a good system for exploration.
When entering lowsec, and local has already one or more toons - leave and come back later.
While in a lowsec system, always have the local open, to see if you are alone or not.
Once someone enters a lowsec system, keep checking 360° scan for combat probes, possibly from cloaked toons near center.
Never go to anomalies in lowsec. Pirates look there first or even wait there for especially you.
The best plexes and sites for exploration in lowsec are those with the weakest signal - once u r cloaked this is a safespot.
Never ever choose a safespot, which can be choosen from a common menu like e.g. 100km away from ... - always make special ones.

Lowsec isnt that dangerous, as most hisecers think. The most dangerous things in a lowsec are those things, you can navigate to by choosing it from menu or overview without any need to scan. Cloak up, and nobody can find you. With exploration vessels in specific you are able to warp cloaked. Just have enough safespots - formerly found sites, long vanished are good enough.

Cheers