Science & Industry

I think the biggest nerf is that it nails the bots, for a while anyway and THAT is a good thing in my book.

I actually look forward to mining with these changes and I wish there were in place when I first started training for this stuff, er. two years ago now...

Z.

Confirming that mining rots the brain

It simply amazes me how many miners are ignorant to the mining mechanics prior to today's patch. People who are saying hulks were nerfed, or that these changes are bad for miners are either stupid, or have no understanding of what these new changes mean for miners.

Ok, so lets break things down pre-patch and compare them to ships are they are today.

1) Hulks have more yield prior to patch.

a) In fact now that hulks no longer need medium cargohold optimizations you can now use a medium drone mining augmenter I, which increases your yield by 600,000 +/- isk per hour, which is yet more isk per hour to the all ready increase in yield.

b) Prior to patch people would outfit their hulks for max tank. This setup would yield 3% LESS yield per cycle than a covetor (fitted for max yield, and implants), meaning flying a hulk was a waste when you could be in a ship that cost 10x less.

A hulk fitted for tank pre-patch would yield less than a skiff post-patch. Meaning now if you need to be concerned with tank a skiff yield more than what a pre-patch tank would have yielded, but with much more tank, and at 1/3rd the price.

2) Hulk and cargo hold space.

a) Prior to patch people would outfit their hulks for max cargo hold. Again this setup would yield 3% LESS yield per cycle than a covetor (fitted for max yield and implants). But you could hold several cycles worth of ore (4 if I recall).

b) For those who have all ready forgotten, the hulks cargo hold was small to begin with. Even with medium cargo hold optimization I's the hulk could hold about 1 cycle of ore (when fitted for yield) or maybe 2 cycles if you were not using mining drones II and only had a few mining crystals in your cargo hold.

A hulk fitted for cargo hold per-patch would yield less than a Mackinaw post-patch. This means if you want to AFK/idle mine and not worry about cycles or you are solo mining and don't want to jet can the mackinaw with its 30,000m3 cycle not only yields more than a pre-patch Hulk, it also has a huge cargo hold compared to a hulk fitted for space, at a much cheaper price tag.

2) Solo mining.
a) per-patch solo players would either jetcan, fit their ship for cargo space, or mine to station Jetcanning still required 3 or more trips per hour hauling to station. Well guess what. With the mackinaw the time saved per hour out yields a hulk jet canning. And it obviously out yields a hulk mining to station, and now you have no worries about having your cans flipped.

b) Dual boxing players who use an Orca/Hulk setup will now yield FAR greater per hour dual mining in mackinaws. The only benefit to the oOca/Hulk combo was the ability to mine directlly into the Orca, while the boosts made it worth the loss in per hour yield. Well now using 2 mackinaws you can increase your hourly yield and make 2 station trips for every 1 orca station trip you would have needed in the past, with an obviously much cheaper, easier to train to setup for higher yields.

3) Ice mining
a) Ice mining is better in every way. Really no reason to compare per-patch data. Its better.


So to summarize every situation per-patch you would fit your hulk for (yield, cargohold, tank) is now better in every way possible. Want tank? Well you have a really cheap; almost disposable ship that yields more and has more tank. Want cargohold? You now have a ship that yields more with a much larger cargo hold. Want yield? You now have a ship that yields more. Do you dual box? Well you're going to yield more and do less work.

So there you have it. Now I want each of you to smack yourselves in the head, say "Oh this update is awesome!" and if need be dance around the room

No, I have no information saying that CCP has introduced new rig types that act on the size of the ore bay, instead of the cargo bay.

Hold on folks, i have changed my mind. Took my 2 macks out with 35k m3 hold and full orca booster and guess what.............i am raking in much more than i did with hulks. 35 mill an hour with hulks, 50 mill an hour with macks. I love this change

then you're doing something wrong, you'll never mine more with a mackinaw than you can with a hulk, even after the patch.

oh wait, i remember now you were the guy leaving your orca in a pos and mining with expanded hulks, that's what you were doing wrong. never mind.

so long o/

Don't let the door hit you on the way out

CCP needs to offer some sort of rig buy-back program when they do major changes like this. The Hulk was the ONLY mining ship for any purpose but ice mining. The only rigs worth using on it were cargo rigs, because the ones that boost a single type of mineral yield are only good for a small number of nullsec gangs. Add to that the loss you'll take trading a Hulk for a Mack and miners just got taken sans lube. Again.

Also..



LOL, whut? So all ore and minerals sell for the same, do they?



Irrelevant. The Hulk was also the only ORE ship you could actually tank to any real degree. You trained into Covertors, outfitted them for max cargo if soloing or max yield if dual-boxing, and labored in 0.8 or higher until you trained into a Hulk. History isn't up for revision in EVE.

Haha.

I think he's serious.

... which makes it all the funnier.