Science & Industry

If the only thing people cared about was making isk, all of us would have the exact same skill trees and be doing the self same things to make our wallets bulge.

Forgive me, but I thought the idea was to have fun, and isk is only important to get the things you want etc

While true, you're also assuming that you can run 6 toons through missions at the same time. (IDK where you got 8 from, 5 macks + 1 rorq = 6).

Mining is actually loads better than it used to be; though with that said, it's also the lowest skilled way to make money, and you're competing against every other miner, bot, and 2 hour old newbie trying to make a buck on the market. Missions on the other hand are literally ISK-printing machines (rat bounties, mission rewards, it all comes from "nowhere") ... if missions depended more on the market, then you'd probably see their income drop off pretty severely too.

Come again? Minerals are higher than where they were 4 years ago. Drone poo and loot recycling only got ripped out last year (Inferno)

While it is true mining is a lower isk/hr than other activities like ratting, there is a much more basic reason for it. Effort, Yes mining takes much less effort than ratting. It is much easier and safer to mutlibox a mining fleet than a ratting fleet.

Sure if mining in null sec the risk is higher than mining in high sec, but is still a much lower effort/isk than ratting or plexing. In fact mining takes so little effort, the only way to do it without getting bored is by either mutiboxing a whole fleet, or semi afk while doing something else at the same time. It only makes sense that activities that require more effort would make a higher isk/hour.

Now I am not saying you can not do afk ratting, but even semi afk ratting in a Domi or Ishtar or what ever drone boat you prefer is not near the isk/hr you get from actively ratting/plexing in the same area. An afk drone boat is no where near as efficient.

Not all that long ago a miner was lucky to make 10-15M isk/hr. Just before Odyssey that was up to about 25-30M isk/hr Now it is sitting at about 20-25M isk/hr. That is not bad income at all, considering how little effort is required to do it at maximum efficiency. Then there is the fact that multibox mining can be done with very little reduction per account, while mutibox ratting the isk/hr per account drops with each additional account. Personally I have found that mutiboxing 4 or more accounts, I make more isk/hr per account mining than I do ratting or mission running. it scales very well.

Mining has been steadily improved over the last several years, but it will always be the lowest isk/hr activity, because it requires the lowest amount of effort. The only bad thing to happen to mining in the last few years was the significant increase in risk that came with the Odyssey expansion. The ore composition changes were nice, although it did not really increase the isk/hr of mining as the mineral prices just shifted to compensate. However the removal of gravametric sites to be replaced by ore anomalies was a significant increase in risk. Considering the ore composition changes actually resulted in a drop in isk/hr this change had a negative impact on the mining community.

For many null sec miners it is just business as usual. They are so deep inside alliance territory that their risk was minimal to begin with. If there are no hostiles around to gank your miners the amount of effort required to find them is irrelevant. How ever this change has killed mining outside of protected alliance space.

Before Odyssey you could mine in any system, low sec ore null. It was a high risk activity, so much so that very few actually did it. but it could be done profitably. How it worked before was you would find and mine only in gravametric sites. Even if there were hostiles around, even in the local system, If they wanted to hunt you, they would have to scan for either your ship, or the gravametric signature you were mining in. All you had to do was watch D-scan for probes, if you saw any, warp out and safe up. This added a degree of safety but required you pay very close attention, if you dropped your guard you were dead. But if you were alert you could make very good isk mining, even in low sec and NPC null. I refer to this as freelance mining, as it does not require protected sov space, and can be done anywhere.

However with the changes brought in with Odyssey the gravametric sites have been removed, and replaced with ore anomalies. What does this mean? It means that any hostile in the system does not need to scan you down to gank you. You do not get those critical few seconds of warning from seeing probes on D-scan. They can warp directly to the site, and tackle you before you have a chance to warp out. Anyone who mines in these systems now must watch local and warp out or safe up as soon as any unknown pops up in the local channel. The problem with this is that outside of protected sov space, there is always someone in local or passing through. Before odyssey the only ones that were a threat were those equipped with probe launchers, but keeping an eye on D-scan would alert you to them in time to get away, as long as you were alert. . Post Odyssey, now every single unknown passing through the system is potential death. No warning if they are hunting you or not. Now any freelance miner spend more time hiding then mining, making the isk/hr far lower than what they can make in high sec. Making freelance mining no longer profitable. There is no work around for this change, it has killed freelance mining. Freelance miners do not have a fleet available to protect them, if they did they would not be freelance miners, they would be mining in their own Sov space.

Pardon my rant, but this is a very sensitive subject for me. I live in low sec and NPC null. I used to mine a lot, now mining in these systems is suicide. We may be a very small group within the EVE community, but there was no need or benefit to this content being removed. Why was this done? To give gankers more easy targets? If so that idea failed, although these miners are easier to find now, they are no longer there to find.

I have nothing against the ore anomalies, there are a nice addition. But that addition did not require the removal of gravametric sites. Players who run combat sites have the choice between static DED sites, combat anomalies, and combat signatures. The latter of the three requiring probes to find. To be balanced miners should have the choice between static belts, ore anomalies, and gravmetric sites.

Please give us back gravametric sites. Don't let freelance mining die.

Mining is done by bots, by afk people and by isboxers.
These menaces to society keep mineral prices low. many people that gank miners will preferentially target these types of players and indeed many gankers having mining alts and they gank to reduce the unfair advantage these others have.
Mining is not a sensible way to earn isk as a new player and i wish people would stop saying it was.
exploration, missioning, FW, manufacturing and scamming are all just as easy if not easier to get into than mining and all have a higher income.
They are all more fun too.
even station trading is more interesting.

Manually check out the 720 Day History of Isogen or any other mineral at all.

They took a huge spike last November, which got enthusiasm going, but since Odyssey it's just tanking utterly and absolutely.

Inflation is also worse than it was over 2 years ago when they were 'low', so technically, the little bit of value that's higher is countered by the inflationary prices of everything else. PLEX prices anyone ????

Um ...

Isogen, 2011/10/29 -> (approx) 69.8 ISK/unit .... 2013/10/17 -> 131.2 isk/unit. (sell orders) = 87% increase
Tritanium 2011/10/29 -> shy of 4.00 ISK/unit (approx 3.9)..... 2013/10/17 -> 4.95 isk/unit. (sell orders) = 21% incrrease


Admittedly, ships got changed A LOT in that timeframe too (due to tiericide and needing to level the mineral values). So, they're a terrible indicator of things. However, looking at the Abaddon (all sources I find indicate it wasn't changed) :

2011/10/29 -> (approx) 156,000,000 ... 2013/10/17 -> (approx) 210,500,000 (sell orders) = 35% increase

I wouldn't say it's inflation so much as CCP going "oh, and we're increasing the mineral requirements (cost) of all the things by x% to make them in-line with the top ship in each class". If CCP had done tiericide ages ago (before the mining changes) I don't think you'd be saying the same thing.

risk vs reward says hi.

Want some cheese w/ that?

I do not get the reference, what do you mean ?