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as someone who builds all the exhumers... I am very happy with what has happened to skiff prices... just about doubled this week.

All this talk about lack of crystal space in the new barges. Has anybody...you know...considered using common T1 strip miners? Less yield but no worry about crystals.

Just a thought...

Un-shipping a rig destroys it, so what's being refunded?

The extra drones were already there, just placed in cargo/CHA/station IIRC, so nothing was being taken away or refunded, it was just the same thing being moved elsewhere.

The learning skills were not a buff or nerf to any existing item, sorry, but that's not even close to the same thing.

If you can afford T2 Cargo rigs, then you can afford to replace them. Can't you?

I know this is pointless, but let me make one last attempt.

We are being told that Hulks and Covetors are being limited to 5 sets of crystals because it will "force pilots to make some decisions" before undocking. In other threads, some of you have also claimed that this limitation will force fleets to be come up with a plan about who will be mining what.

The problem here is that this change will not place any such burden on most miners. Instead, it will only affect the subset of miners who operate in SOV and wormhole space.

Let's take Miner A, who lives in Amarrian Empire space. Gravitational sites rarely spawn in his systems, and he really doesn't bother looking for them. Instead, his mining is limited to just the four ores that appear in Amarrian high sec -- Veldspar, Scordite, Pyroxeres, and Kernite. He hasn't even bothered to train the ore specialization skills for any of the other ores, because he never even sees them. When he gets home from work and goes mining, he just jumps in his Hulk. It's strip miners are already loaded with 3 Veldspar crystals (from the last op). His cargo bay already contains 3 Scordite, 3 Pyroxeres, and 3 Kernite crystals (taking up 225 cubic meters), plus one spare crystal for each of the 4 ore types in his system. No forethought, no planning, and no communication with other miners is needed. His Hulk is always ready to go.

Miner B lives in SOV null sec space, in an alliance with a number of other corps. Most of his mining takes place in gravitational sites, and the miners in his alliance have worked hard to upgrade their main mining system to both reach and maintain the desired industry level. They have a large asteroid cluster spawned in the system at all times, and it contains 12 different ore types. To be able to mine in these belts (plus the regular belts that appear in his system), he has had to train 4 times longer than Miner A, since he needs to mine all 16 different ore types in the game.

When Miner B gets home from work and wants to go mining, other alliance members have already been in the belt ahead of him. There's no way of knowing what kinds of ores are still in the belt, how many units are remaining, or where those asteroids are located in relation to one another. One of the bigger mining corps in his alliance is made up of primarily Russian speakers, and communication is difficult. In any event, it's already late in Russia and most of them have gone to bed. Another group of miners comes from the German corp. They are still in the belt, but language difficulties make it hard to have a conversation about ore types. So Miner B makes some random guesses about which ore types he might find when he lands in the belt, hoping for Arkonor, Bistot, Crokite, Hemorphite, and Hedbergite. He loads in 3 of those crystals apiece, and warps to the corp bookmark for the current large grave site.

When he lands, he realizes that his guesses were awful. All of the Arkonor is gone. The Germans have 3 Hulks hitting the last remaining Bistot rock with 3 lasers apiece. There are still 2 Crokite asteroids left, but they are far away from each other. and neither one is currently in range. He can't even scan them to see how much is left in them. There is one Hemorphite rock just 15 km away, but his scanner shows that it has only 520 units left in it. All of the other Hemorphite is too far away to either mine or examine with his survey scanner. His only lucky guess was Hedbergite. There is one untouched Hedgbergite rock within range. It could keep him mining for an hour or more, but not if he nails it with all 3 lasers at the same time. But what choice does he have? The only other rocks within range are 2 nicely-sized Kernites (that he doesn't have crystals for) and a Spodumain that nobody wants to bother with.

So he slowly turns his Hulk around, spends the painfully long aligning time writing down a list of the closest asteroids, makes a few bookmarks to some asteroids that are too far away to hit with his scanner (hoping that there is still a decent amount left in them) and warps back to the station. There he reloads with a different set of crystals, and heads back out to one of his new bookmarks. When he gets there, though, he finds that the Crokite that he warped in on is largely exhausted, and that there really are no other rocks in range.

He docks, shuts down Eve, and goes to play World of Tanks.

This Hulk configuration will only have its stated effect on Miner B. Miner A will get max yield without any need to make choices. Miner B -- who has already paid a price in having to train all those different ore specialization skills and working with less efficient refineries -- is essentially forced to choose a less efficient ship.

Nothing I say here will change anything. But I thought I would make one last attempt to explain why those of us who live in these asteroid cluster sites really do need to carry more than just 13 crystals into the belts.

Miner B needs to:

1: Stick with WOT if having to make a quick warp back to station is so exhausting.

or

2: Find an alliance that he can communicate with, perhaps even work in concert with.

Congratulations, that is possibly the most convoluted whine I have ever read.

As said, most of the changes are ok but still some things are missing

- Ice Harvester II needs the same fitting requirements as T2 strip miners

Currently you can fit whatever mining barge exhumer you like for ore/mercoxit mining with a bit of a tank (and to upgrades in the low slots). If you change for ice harvesting (harvesters and upgrades) you have to remove the tank. Now that the same ship is going to be the king in ice and ore yield it should be possible to just replace the mining/harvesting gear without having to touch the remaining modules providing a decent tank.


- Calibration Cost for mining rigs should go down to 200

Currently, you would move to 0.0 with a hulk, a mackinaw and a skiff to be able to get maximum yield.
Without the change mentioned above you'll need a hulk for ice mining and a hulk for mercoxit mining.
With the change you would need a single hulk

This would provide the king of the hill ship for mining

no because then the other ships have higher yield, ehp, and tank... why would you pick a hulk if it has less of everything?

Miner B really needs to learn how to use a frigate, a microwarpdrive, and a survey scanner. I would also suggest that Miner B should find a different corp where there are people who play at the same time as Miner B who speak the same language as Miner B.

As far as contrived examples go, 7/10. You left out the ever-present AFK cloaker and the awoxer.

Though Miner B would greatly benefit from a frigate with the survey scanner bonus of an Orca. Perhaps we should be pestering CCP to release an ORE covert ops frigate? No weapons, but a nice bonus to survey scanner distance along with the usual covert ops perks.

i didn't miss the point at all, the other poster asked about using t1 strips, to which i replied it just makes the hulk worst at everything.

i think you're trying to shoehorn a point in to a conversation that you're not a part of.

(let me try again)

Sorry poster, but you are reading the dev blog wrong. CCP Ytterbium never stated, that hulk pilots would have to fit T1 strips to deal with less cargo room. (As well as most common posts, of just get more when you dock, or go pick some up) That is not what CCP Ytterbium said hulk pilots would do, to deal with a smaller cargo.

All CCP Ytterbium said that hulk pilots would have to do is : rely on others to haul and resupply them with mining crystals.

There it is, the solution. The one and only correct solution. Hulks can stay in an asteroid field, for as long as they want to and never worry about crystals.

On the other hand, other players will have to bring the hulk pilots their crystals, when they are needed. I do wonder what players will step up to bat.