Science & Industry

by the time the session change is over your hulk is dead.

even tanked hulks are fragile .. you did tank them right?

But houston we have a problem, The ship going into the orca can not have anything in its ore bay and I believe no slavage in its cargo bay either. Not sure on all the restriction for the cargo bay. I believe only ammo and mining crystals are allowed to be in the cargo bay. So considering your already racing against the clock well you know...

A good tank is a necessity if for no other reason than to reduce the likelihood of the scanning vessel to choose you as the gankers next target. It might be possible to the Orca thing but there are better options to try.

1) I think you can get about 22 or 23k EHP on a Hulk including bonuses from the Orca 'Shield Harmonizing' link. You need high resistances on the kinetic & thermal.
2) Check the location/s you mine in on killboards. It may be they are very popular with scumbags, I mean gankers, and therefore you would be wise to relocate. Some systems are never worth mining in as we all know.
3) Collect local intel via killboards and local channel. Gankers generally frequent the same systems. If you are trying to mine in one of those systems It's not worth the bother.

where do you mine? how\low\null?

do you stay near the pc or you mine afk?

also I always stay aligned to a safe spot and immediately warp out once I see anyone get into overview.. saved my ships many times.

How can I possibly mine all the time and NOT be ganked in over 2 1/2 years ?

Never be AFK. Ever.

Keep an eye on Local.

When a gank goes down, it's so obvious that it's about to happen, you pretty much deserve it if you are that oblivious to what's going on around you. What's the purpose of playing this game if one is not actually playing this game ?

Just some advice.

In my experience of over 4.5 years of mining in same Hulk, hisec gankers are not especially hard to avoid.

Rule #1: don't be AFK!

When you warp into a belt and see miner wrecks or CONCORD, expect trouble and consider changing systems.

When you see that other miner park nearby, assume he is a warp-in point and move away. It also helps to have an Orca nearby and refit a ship scanner to see if the miner is really a miner.

Watch local. If it has criminals and suspects, you should consider docking and / or finding another system. Also watch the discussion. Gankers tend to be boastful, and some even issue a warning before they attack. CONCORD spam is also something to watch for, as is changes in local count, spikes or even slower growth.

I use a rule of thumb: no more people in local than there are belts. This is quite easy to do outside Caldari space, especially in Amarr space. [Hence I grew-up in Amarr space.]

Lastly use d-scan. If you see a fleet of catalysts / thrashers / talwar / algos / brutix / etc. at max range, be safe and GTFO. Set your d-scan to filter on overview, so you don't see: structures, wrecks, drones, containers. Typically I set the range to 2 au (~300,000,000 km), less if there is a nearby station / gate / etc.

If you are mining in a deadspace, and you see combat probes within 4 au, this is also a good GTFO moment.

Get to know your locals. After awhile, you get to know who your local miners are. If any strangers warp in, GTFO.

Ditch the Hulk and get a tanked Skiff. Problem solved.

Some excellent points here.

Also, dotlan can be a great tool as it can show you ship/pods kills over the last 48 hours. This can be useful in picking the right system to mine in.

I've only ever had one attempt on my miner alt by suicide gankers (ironically, they didn’t fit T2 so i ended up with a nice killmail) because I dont mine in busy systems, I stick to out of the way quiet 0.5 systems and can mine happily without seeing another sole for hours. Sure it means a little more work in hauling my goods to market but given that its safer, I'm good with that trade off.

If you are afk mining, I would strongly recommend that you do it in a retriever. They are so cheap that they are less likely to be ganked to begin with, but even if you are the cost to replace them is negligible.

Learn to spot and avoid gankers, avoid the locations they normally frequent, move when they show up and learn to better compensate for your losses. Procurers and Skiffs are generally left alone but can be considerably lower yield. If you get ganked less than every 12 hours of play however, consider this approach:
http://indecisivenoob.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/alternative-approach-yield-tank.html

I run this approach, and have not to this date been ganked thanks to gank avoidance (2 systems set up with identical gear so I can easily swap one to the other), but if I were to be ganked, I could be back out with a new set of gear and confident that I'm still up on yield compared to the alternatives.