Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I don't see any other threads mentioning this but the search feature is borked right now so if I missed it, sorry for the sperg.

IRL there are gold mines and there are "gold mines". The primary difference being one you find gold ore in, and the other just digs up a lot of rock that has a higher than average concentration of gold than everything else on earth. You dig a few thousand tons of rock and get an ounce of gold.

One way of helping with the "Technetium problem" or moon mining monopolies in general would be adding trace amounts of moon mining materials as "trace elements" to standard ores. For balance concerns ( risk VS reward ) these amounts would need be tiny and probably confined to Jaspet and below which would give people more reason to mine in lowsec. The balance seems simple in that there are 5 rarity divisions in moon mining with four elements each and 10 ores from Jaspet to Mercoxit. Two trace elements could be assigned each ore based on security status or rarity and in amounts like say .1 unit per refine cycle wouldn't give you crazy amounts like a real moon mining operation, but it would give a slow trickle spread more or less evenly throughout. ( .1 unit/batch is just a glance number... the actual best amount would need calculation and balance but it's just as an example ). While the amounts certainly wouldn't break the monopolies up multiple sources of these materials would ease the sourcing a bit, and you would still need reactors to process it. If a balance were struck such that for example, for every hundred ships worth of minerals mined you might get enough trace elements to react and give you the raw materials to turn one of them into the equivalent tech 2 variant I don't think anyone would cry about it.

It would never be as pure as OTEC produced Tech!

Kidding aside, it's a damn fine idea and would help in several ways

CCP.. make it happen!

This is a cool cool idea! I love it. It works, it fits with Alchemy and solves a few issues! Nice call Saiphas Cain! :D