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Help making isk as a science toon..
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Scouty ScooterT
Doomheim
#1 - 2013-03-20 03:42:23 UTC
Hey all,

So been playing the game for a few months now and got my science skill up to start working as a science toon making t2 bpc. I worked on my empire standings enough that I can hang a tower. I decided on a small tower with 2 mobile labs and an advance lab to do my work at. I have 5 lvl 4 agents....6 in a few days to supplement my datacore needs, the rest I will get from the local market.

I know that I will be running a single man corp since the risk of theft with the current POS access is too great. So that isn't an issue. But should I just use the contract system to place the copies on the market and hope for the best, or should I look into joining an industrial alliance to provide for their production lines?

Also, is the formula for the cost of the BPC just the regular (cost of datacores) * (base chance of success)=price? Or is their a better one out there that I'm not seeing?

What I am wanting to know isn't the what to make or where, more of the how to get these BPCs sold quickly and efficently to pay for the tower and have enough isk left over to make it worth the effort. Just looking for tips from the masters lol.....any help is greatly appreciated.
Haulie Berry
#2 - 2013-03-20 04:13:08 UTC
The average (or expected) cost of producing a T2 BPC is going to be the cost per attempt divided by the success chance.

The cost per attempt is NOT just the cost of datacores though. There's also the cost of the T1 BPC (if this is 0, you're doing it wrong), any decryptors used, cost for the lab time, the cost of any meta-items used, etc.
Grigori Annunaki
#3 - 2013-03-20 06:34:52 UTC
Since you're running your POS, I would suggest counting the cost of fuel as a monthly expense rather than trying to assess a per-BPC equivalent. Once you've been up and running a while, you'll have a good idea of your productivity and can come up with a fairly accurate "fuel surcharge" on the BPCs you invent.

To build on Haulie's point, even if you mine/extract/build/etc. the pieces yourself, you should ALWAYS include the market cost in your calculations. Depending on market fluctuations, you may find it's more profitable to sell the ingredients than the final result.

The general cost equation is something like:

Invention Cost = (Fuel Surcharge + Datacore + T1 BPC + decryptor + base item cost) / (chance of success)

As a concrete example, let's say you want to sell Void M blueprints and you can throw 20 Antimatter M BPCs through the hopper per day. Given a rough fuel cost of 100M/30 days, your fuel surcharge is approximately 166k per attempt. Blueprint costs are roughly 250k, and you won't be using a decryptor or base item. T1 BPC cost is a wild guess at 50k. Decent skills will net you about a 48% success rate, giving you the following cost:

(166k + 250k + 50k + 0 + 0) / 0.48 = 970k

Obviously, you'll want to minimize your costs and maximize your throughput in order to get your cost down and profit up, but this should give you a feel for how to approach the accounting.
Postitute
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#4 - 2013-03-20 06:51:14 UTC
When I evaluated the t2 BPC market it didn't look that great, but things may have changed as this was a few years back. Depends a lot on the BPC. I've found that coupling both the invention and the production to be very profitable however. I do mostly ship modules in large quantities and sell in mission or trade hubs. Most all of the components for production/invention of the t2 module are purchased from the market.

Equipment Assembly arrays are great for this type of work.

When pricing the cost to produce BPCs I tend to focus on the direct variable costs, which is pretty much what you have in the calc you listed. As Haulie pointed out, there can be a cost associated with the t1 BPC(s) that you used in the invention. I say "can" here because the opportunity costs have to be pretty well defined in order for me to bother factoring them in. In my case, I'm inclined to value the t1 module BPC(s) that I invented off of to be at or near zero because the market value for these is usually fairly low, not to mention a headache to sell through contracts. Similarly, because the time required to do the copy job on these BPCs is usually fairly low, and a "less direct" cost, I ignore it as well. (someone here is probably going to take issue with this Blink )

As far as accounting for the POS resources, I treat it as a fixed cost to my operation as a whole. So for example I often look about a month out and multiply my forecasted daily profits from selling t2 modules x 30 days, and then subtract from that number the cost for 30 days of POS fuel.
Velicitia
XS Tech
#5 - 2013-03-20 10:12:57 UTC
Postitute wrote:
BPCs is usually fairly low, and a "less direct" cost, I ignore it as well. (someone here is probably going to take issue with this Blink )



while it is a bit of a lie to yourself .. if you're making the copies in parallel to the invention with an alt, their cost is low, since it doesn't cost any more fuel to have 5 labs instead of 3 these days ... and definitely lower than an unused/empty slot.

One of the bitter points of a good bittervet is the realisation that all those SP don't really do much, and that the newbie is having much more fun with what little he has. - Tippia
Kodama Ikari
Thragon
#6 - 2013-03-20 13:58:29 UTC
Scouty ScooterT wrote:

I know that I will be running a single man corp since the risk of theft with the current POS access is too great.

This isn't necessarily true unless you plan to hand the keys over to anyone you bring into the corp.

Selling t2 bpcs will probably suck unless you can arrange someone who will buy them. Most people do invention and production and sell the products. The problem is you have to do a lot more calculation to find what is profitable. If you're paying the fuel for a tower, you should probably train the two other slots on your account for copying. I think you only need the basic research skills to make copies on these characters, not the datacore skills or metallurgy.

Some first-hand PI tips
Ishaki
Caldari Prime Investments
#7 - 2013-03-21 19:39:22 UTC  |  Edited by: Ishaki
The t2 bpc market I have found isn't al that great. The vast majority of people that make t2 items do their own invention. You may find that there are people looking to buy your bpc's directly as a bulk buy or you may get some sell here and there (I sell the odd jump freighter bpc, and people do buy the more expensive ones because of the investments involved).

You will want to research the market very carefully before deciding to go down the invent > sell t2bpc path
Kara Books
Deal with IT.
#8 - 2013-03-22 21:25:40 UTC
quite a few tricks to the trade here, starting from zilch is kinda tough.

Remember, if your buying BPC's at to high of a cost then you arent the one making the profit.

When prices on datacores spike, on materials spike and you have NO reserves, your research and manufacture grinds to a complete and utter halt while the POS continues to eat teh ice.

Do not store BPO's in a POS

Do not believe what every one tells you, the right way is always the end result of a long process of mistakes and hurdles (invention is one of the hardest things in eve to master-BUT-can be VERY lucrative once you have everything set up perfectly)