Warfare & Tactics

Out of curiousity, why are you planning on mining in lowsec? The ores aren't drastically better than ones available in highsec, but the danger is vastly increased.

Now, if you absolutely must do it, I would start out by finding a quiet system with extremely minimal traffic; dead-end systems or detour systems are good, while pipe systems are bad. Also, ensure that it has a station, so that everybody can dock up if **** hits the fan.

When moving your mining ships into the system, use scouts in cheap frigates or shuttles to jump in first, so that if there's a camp you won't lose your ships horribly.

Once you're set up in your belt, watch local like a hawk. If anybody not in your corp/alliance enters local, everybody warp to the station and dock up ASAP. Don't bother trying to organize a defense fleet; it's simply safer to dock up and wait for the danger to pass. Once local is clear again, you're free to head back out to the belt and continue your mining.

I would also recommend using ships like Covetors rather than Hulks. Sure, Hulks mine about ~10% more, but risking a 200mil ship as opposed to a 30mil one for such little increased profits isn't really worth it imo. I probably also wouldn't bother with an Orca.

Also, make sure to use scouts again upon leaving the lowsec system.

OK, don't keep us guessing. What's the 'point' you're wanting to make?

You basically need to park a complete combat fleet on grid with you, preferably with some ECM included to ensure the barges have time to align and warp out. Use T1 barges and industrials to pick up from jet cans. Don't even risk the Hulks. The payoff will not be worth it, and in any event a low sec "mining op" has more value if it's really just a trap for careless pirates.

When I was experimenting with mining back in my slightly less nooby days I decided it would be a good idea to solo mine in my vexor while in a random low-sec system.

About five seconds after I started mining a harby showed up and blew me up in about 3 seconds.

Don't ever mine in low-sec. Even if you have a fleet protecting you, you are still taking a major risk.

If you want to mine outside of hi-sec, head to null but be smart about it. Find a nice isolated system and if any PVP activity has happened there in the past 24 hours, don't go there.

If you decide to go solo, make sure you are the only one in the system, even if there is only one other person, the sight of a mining ship on the scanner will make him want to grab some stuff to blow you up.

Honestly though, if you want to be truly safe, join a decent null-sec corp that has some control over a system, whether it be sov or a simple display of force and mine there I guess.

But low-sec is really just asking to get ganked.

It would need heavy CAP, even though the numbers of enemies would increase as time went on until even the CAP was overwhelmed and once that is done they would feed on juicy mining ships.

Would be a great way to start a massive fight in low sec with all the T1 ships running in for a kill I suppose. Maybe if a competent player FC couple use the mining op for bait it would be awesome and for sure the salvage and modules from the baited would be worth more than the mining op so....

It's the same Ice as before they removed all ice from systems with security greater than 0.7. Bad ice goes in highsec where there's minimal risk if you're not a ******, good ice goes where the risk is.

Just don't.

The standard/smart answer is; Just dont.

While low sec ore is slightly better than HS, once you calculate the time wasted warping out to a pos or safe every time a neut jumps into local you end up loosing isk/hour. Combine this with isk splits for the people doing BG work and I find it very hard to believe it's worth your while.

Exxcept, if you scan out a very above average grav site. In a perfect circumstance where the system is a dead end with no stations and no active worm holes it just barely might be worth the effort. Do not assume you're safe just because you're not in a belt. If you scanned it out chances are someone else has to so you might not get any warning with combat probes on d-scan. Grab the high end stuff and gtfo.

Start by making off grid safes then bm'ing the high end roids so the miners can warp right on top of them. You'll also need safes in every system on the route to the site.

Best fleet comp is a cov ops or recon to scout you in then watch the gate for visitors, then as much e-war as you can bring, then the mining ships. Blackbirds/falcons are best, celestis/arazu with scan res dampening are decent.

On the off shoot chance you're a Ernest Hemingway type maniac just looking for adventure, Vexor gang is best. 3 mining lasers, 2 med neuts. 2 Heavy armor rep drones, 5 mining drones, and 5 warrior 2's. 4 man gang can chain 8 heavy drones repping with 12 warriors attacking which will scare/kill most pirates away and make for lots of lulz.

Gl

Back in my mining days I used to mine Gneiss in lowsec grav sites pretty regularly. Was pretty good ISK actually. But I was smart about it and watched my d-scan like a hawk.

These days you can do the same thing in wormhole grav sites and make way more money mining A/B/C ores.