EVE New Citizens Q&A

Is it possible to get the billion ISK for a Plex through mining?

I find it fun.

It's worst ISK/h you can get if yu are not max equipped and skilled.

EVE is a game. Not a daytime job.
If the ISK/hour is a goal in it self - that's fine with me.
My self I keep doing what I find fun while earning ISK to pay for more fun.

And suicide gankers from CODE will further frustrate your attempts by repeatedly killing your mining ship.

Mining can be a lot of fun IMHO if done correctly, which to me means being in a big mining fleet working together with friends to be as efficient as possible. That being said I'm not sure how much of that is in game any longer.

Like other's have said this is a game and it should be fun. If you are coming here with the intent to earn enough isk through mining to pay for a PLEX every month it will very much become like a job. If you want a job sitting at your computer teach yourself how to code and get some freelance side work. Otherwise just play the game and do what is fun. If in the process of having fun you happen to find that you have enough extra isk to buy a PLEX then by all means go ahead. I just would not set it as a goal for yourself.

I did know a guy once that did do what you are talking about here but PLEX prices were much cheaper back then. Also I only know of one guy that has ever done it and I probably know of hundreds that have quit this game trying to do it.

Abstracts aside I will get to some numbers but as a caveat or disclaimer I would like to point out that I have not mined seriously in a long long time and there have been many changes to mining since I last did. That being said I'll give a little example below, I am using Crokite for this example because it is the fifth most valuable of the T1 ores (Mercoxit being the only T2 ore) and all of those top 5 are roughly similar in value and thus should be readily available in any upgraded null sec system.

So using the ore chart located at this site: http://ore.cerlestes.de/#site:ore I determined that the current value of 1 m3 of Crokite is 404.98 isk. Using the Eve fitting tool I determined that a fully skilled hulk pilot can mine 1597 m3 per minute. So if I have all of this right so far that is 646,753.06 isk per minute or 38,805,183.60 isk per hour.

That number surprised me when I calculated it because it is way more than the ore used to be worth but still I can make more isk doing other things like ratting or running anoms or exploration etc...

That number also needs a bit more context. That is the value of the minerals that the ore refines to not the ore it's self. Further it is based on the value of the minerals at a market hub in high sec and you are mining the ore in null sec. Further you would need a hauler to haul the ore for you as you are mining to not have any down time on your lazors. One hauler should be able to handle 5 hulks so for theoretical sake you could deduct 20% for a cut to a hauler. Also with Rorqual boosts I think you get about another 35% on top of that but of course you need to cut the Rorqual pilot in on the deal and pay for the ice products to deploy the ship as well as your own T2 crystals.

Any way so let's add 15% to the maxed out Hulk just for theory's sake and say 44,625,961.14 isk per hour. Divide a Billion by that and I get 22.4 hours. That is several maxed out hulk pilots and a maxed out Rorqual pilot with a balanced number of skilled haulers and a perfect refiner and assuming that you can get market hub prices locally. You'll need to pay someone to haul the ore to market if you can not sell it locally.

As a new pilot you will be much lower than that. You can use EFT ( Eve Fitting Tool ) and Evemon to figure out which ships you can fly in what amount of time and what your yield will be a month from now and 3 months from now etc...

no , you cant, its possible certainly, just horrifically ill advised to attempt.

Mining is an OK source of starter capital for new players.

Long term it is passable supplement to income for people that need to be AFK. You know the sort of thing, have little kids, or have some job that just requires they be there but only actually do something on rare occasions, like some reception work or watching security screens,

With regard to plexing. Doing the maths you only need 40 mill a day to PLEX so anyone in a barge or exhumer could PLEX by mining several hours every night (probably near impossible in a venture on trit though) however as stated above do you really want to ?

I just did some numbers....
I sorta have a few skills for mining but i rarely do it.
Sooo, when i would mine in my procurer barge, i could get about 2 mil per 15 minutes of mining,
so thats about 8 mil/hour
so if you mined for 12 hours per day for 12 days straight, you could get your plex!

1: Dont try to get a plex ingame, you can just pay for one by working at McDonalds for 2 hours instead of 12 days of work.
2: Mining is the worst way to make money and is the most boring.

As many have pointed out:
* mining is the lowest isk/hr of any thing you can do in eve. Im doing anoms right now in high sec and i make more isk an hour goofing off doing that than a well skilled miner.
*While mining may seem like fun for you now and some do enjoy it, very few people do it constantly. It gets very redundantly boring very quickly. Give it a month and you will be wanting to try other things.
* you can make better isk doing anything else and make about the same in minerals just killing stuff and reprocessing loot.
* if you insist on mining, your best bet, once you train skills up some and get in something decent is to get in a 0.0 indy corp. It will give you access to much better rocks as well as mining fleets and bonuses.