Science & Industry

Strip Miners + Tank or Strip Miners + MLUs

MLU = Mining Laser Upgrade

A fitting I use for high-sec level 3 mining missions is:
It is cap stable with 1 strip miner running, and when the mission rats are dead, off goes the tank and the other strip gets turned on. One of the missions (Pile of Pithix) can spawn 3-6 cruiser drones and 5-20 frigate drones. If it is at the weak end of the scale, I don't run out of shields before the rats run out. If it is on the bad end of the scale, I have to make several trips back to the repair shop.

Change the rigs to suit the rats in your area.

^^ This.

I would even not bother with rigs or mid slots unless they are adding to yield. Fit a cheap tank if you want, but nothing expensive.

A retriever even with the best tank you can put on it is way to easy to gank. It is not worth giving up yield for tank as not amount of tank will suvive a suicide gank. They are cheap to buy, so best option is max yield.

Most gankers do not bother with T1 mining ships. The kill mail looks bad as the ship is worth less than the ship used to gank it. And forget making a profit off the gank. Fit it for max yield, and unless you are in gank territory the ship should pay for it self 10 times over before you lose it. Adding expensive tanking mods just increases your potential loss.

A retriever is best to be viewed as a throw away ship. Keep it cheap, and if you do get ganked, no big loss. It is when you get into exhumers that you want to get a good tanking fit. They are expensive and worth ganking, and thus worth protecting.

not empty quoting.

I would love to see that fit. I can hit 21k ehp armor tanked with a retriever, it not only requires rigs but T2 rigs. And it doesn't leave enough power grid to even fit 2 T2 strips.

With a combination shield/armor/hull tank using all rig slots you can hit about 20k ehp and still fit two T2 strips but again needs T2 rigs. And you lose a lot of yield.

You do know we are talking about a retriever right? Or are you officer fitting it?

1 medium slot and 3 low slots with a base ehp of 7,806 there is no way of hitting 21k ehp without rigs. Even using officer mods. On a Mackinaw sure, but not a retriever.

With no rigs a retriever can fit 3 MLU II's in the lows and 2 T2 srips in the highs with a survey scanner in the single mid. very cheap. 2-3 hours of mining and the hull and fitting is payed for. If you get ganked not a big loss, if you don't you are making good yield and good isk/hr.

If you choose to tank a retriever a DCII and 2 reinforced bulkhead II's in the lows is cheap and gives you decent ehp of 15k without rigs. you can even put a hull rep in the mid if you want. But in my experience retrievers are better off maxing yield as they pay for themselves so fast you can afford to replace them if you do get ganked. If you are that worried about getting ganked a procurer can hit 80k ehp without a huge yield loss compared to the retriever. Even a max yield procurer can easily hit 50k ehp. And still pulls in over 1100m3 per minute with decent skills(before boosts), 3508m3/cycle with my skills.

because when the hell does a retriever ever take armour damage without being blown up?
and no, the loss of yield isn't going to be outweighed by never taking armour damage.

Fit it for max yield and mine in areas where you only get ganked if you self-destruct. Brain tank, best tank.

How are you guys fitting more than 5X Hobgoblins in a 25 m3 hold?

I'd like to know as well.

If mining in a system with rats, I usually use Mining Drones x 3, and Hobgoblins (or whatever) x 2.

Two lights scouts are sufficient to take out the rats.

Otherwise if I'm mining in ratless systems, it's Mining Drones x 5.

Toss an invulnerability II into the mid and its 22.5k EHP. And you upset all the purists by dual-tanking.

But to the OP, I'd go with the max yield fit. Use T1 until you get the skills for T2:

Strips, scanner, mining laser upgrades

or a light tank:

Strips, invul, 2 MLUs and a damage control.