EVE New Citizens Q&A

Hello i am fairly new player (2 months or so ) and i had a few questions about mining. I am a PVP based player and decided i wanted to mine as a way to make ISK to support pvping. In a few hours i will have level 5 mining which means i can equip the modulated strip miners to mine ore and use the t2 mining upgrades. But someone mentioned to me that i should train the mining crystals before using the t2 modulated strip miners and that it would be better to use the t1 strip miners untill i can train for the crystals. Is this accurate? or should i just use the t2 miners instead of the t1.

Listen to Brokk's advice.

However if you decide to go your own way and stick to your plan, the someone is correct. T1 strip miners mine more than T2 unless you use the crystals.

Tl;dr.
Listen to Brokk.
T1 strip miners > T2 (without crystals)

As other's have stated mining is not good isk. If you enjoy doing it by all means do it. However if you are only doing it for the isk then pretty much anything else you do will make you better isk. The only time mining is good is if either you enjoy doing it or if you have problems focusing and need something to do while watching movies / videos on the other screen.

Large fleet mining OPs can be fun if done properly but solo high sec mining is less than ideal.

The above being said and to answer your original question, if you right click and select "show info" on both the strip minner and modulated strip minner ( from the market ) you will see the "Attributes" without your skills figured in. If you do it from a module fitted to your ship you will see it with your skills figured in. So on the the numbers:

They both have a 180 second cycle time so that make no difference.

The strippers mine 540 m3 ( again base amount with no skills or ship bonuses figured in but since those are all percentage based then again that makes no difference when comparing the modules )

Modulated strippers yield 360 m3. Now that is with no crystals loaded.

Now look at crystals. T1 Veldspar Mining Crystals have a 1.625 multiplier. T2 have a 1.75 multiplier. So when you multiply that by the base you get 585 m3 for T1 and 630 m3 for T2. You only get those bonuses if you are mining veldspar. If you switch ores you need to switch crystals. The crystals take damage and eventually need to be replaced so they add cost and effort to your minning.

If you are minning null sec ores in a fleet with decent boosts and are sitting on the same type of asteroid or at least not changing much and you have the ability to use T2 crystals then it is almost certainly worth using the modulated strippers.

If you are in high sec switching from rock to rock, changing ore types a lot, having short cycles dues to small asteroids, have no boosts, and are using T1 crystals then it is probably not worth the effort and expense to bother with the modulated strippers and crystals.

Anything in-between those two extremes and you'll likely have to decide for your self what the benefit is and if it is worth it.

As many others have said: try to find an ISK making activity that synergizes well with pvp, skill wise.

A pvp player obviously needs combat skills, if you are skilling for that you are skilling as well for missions, belt-ratting, anoms, combat signatures, etc... These all pay as good or better than mining. Skillpoints in mining are effectively wasted as they benefit mining, and mining alone.

Another activity that can combine pve and pvp very well is exploration. Many pvp groups will value a player who is able to scan. Also, if you're going for piracy, many easy but valuable targets can be found in data and relic sites.

Grab a venture, find a WH and do some gas mining.

Much better ISK, and you have very decent chance of running into people to reship and PvP with in the process.

WH gas is only profitable if you're in a C3 or above (compared to high sec mining) and it involves a lot of scanning and is only really viable if you're living in a wormhole that has access to statics that you can roll consistently for more sites.

What Ralph and Trevor said was extremely logical: if you like pvp, use the skills you already have to make money instead of taking a huge tangential skill plan that will set you back in terms of pvp.

Exploration, mission running and anomaly running all have cross-compatibility with pvp skills and are coincidentally all better ways to make money than mining.

Regardless if you can make better isk, the process of WH mining is certainly more engaging and entertaining as a whole.

unless your a bait deer!
some Body Armour, and a couple of mates on the radio with a mortar ...
sound like a funny fight to me.

Edit : oh wait, deer hunting not hunting deer