Missions & Complexes

::: Reserved :::

350 m from salvage? Well, thats the key, it seems. 107 m in two hours without salvage is good for solo. You used 3 chars, so it is 35 m per char. Or less then 20 m per hour.

No idea, what did you salvage after you blitz missions (so not so many wrecks) but you did it right. 235 m per hour per 3 chars means almost 80 m per 1 char and that is a very good result for L4 mission running.

With the greatest and respect you used 3 characters here. It's great that you've written up how you did this but that ISK per hr is divided across 3 accounts it's not quite the same at the of the day.

Thank you though for the write up it's good to see different methodologies that people are using to fine tune stuff and see what they can do.

As well as the time to cash in/sell LPs, then divide it all by 3, given three accounts...

Here are the results from about an hour and a half of game play, running whatever standard Lv4s that happened to show up with the agent(s). I've included docking, undocking, transit time, mission time, replenishing of ammunition and salvaging. I'm currently limited to 4 mobile tractor units, so if I can boost this number I'll probably be able to achieve a slightly better rate of return on missions since I don't have to return to base as often. I rounded all mission and salvage run times up to the nearest minute.

For salvage I'm just looting and not actually returning to salvage the wrecks with something like a Noctis. A lot of mission wrecks will disappear during the course of chaining missions and I'm not convinced that the extra time spent will necessarily translate into more ISK/hour. I don't salvage drone missions at all because the loot is basically nonexistent. I invested around 65m ISK for 10 standard MTUs, and I expect I'll eventually lose one or two to hostile action or forgetting to bookmark a mission. Ammunition costs are negligible as I manufacture my own, but I typically pay for the costs out of the occasional Storyline mission I'm offered.

I have not included liquidating salvage or redeeming LP because I have a decent enough cash flow for minor expenditures. I can easily contract to one of the major trade hubs if need be, and as LP is split between three characters (note that it doesn't need to be, but I like sharing mission rewards to have the option of boosting and recovering standings) you typically want to save up a bit to acquire the items that will give you the best rate of return. Note that I'm using a fixed rate of 1200 ISK/LP, which is if anything on the low side - but I wanted this to be as realistic as possible.

Mission List: Smuggler, Duo, Angels, Damsel
Total mission time: 00:36:00m
Total salvage time: 00:08:00m

Mission rewards/bounties: 42.5m ISK
LP rewards: 23.9m ISK (19,893 @1200 ISK/LP)
Salvage: 37.4m ISK
Grand Total: 103.8m ISK / 00:44:00m
...

Mission List: Infiltrated, Unauthorized, Cargo, Score, Scarlet
Total mission time: 00:43:00m
Total salvage time: 00:07:00m

Mission rewards/bounties: 57.3m ISK
LP rewards: 26.9m ISK (22,440 @1200 ISK/LP)
Salvage: 29.8m ISK
Grand Total: 114.0m ISK / 00:50:00m
...

Total mission time: 01:19:00h
Total salvage time: 00:15:00m
Total mission ISK: 217.8m ISK / 01:19:00h = 165.4m ISK/hour
Total mission/salvage ISK: 217.8m ISK / = 01:34:00h = 139.0m ISK/hour

If you're talking about his first post, that's because of tags.

Ok, situation is clear now. Just FYI, most people do not confuse loot and salvage. 350 m from loot is ok, 350 m from salvage is a mirracle. ;)

Basically it is like exploration - you got your lucky day, data site will give you almost a bilion in loot. You have bad week - and your loot is crap like few milions ISK after several hours of jumping and scanning, every day.

Yes, 'Abound' - thanks for catching that. With LP and full loot (including salvage) it can be upwards of 250m ISK just for the series. The only downside (aside from the standings hit) is that Enemies 5/5 takes about 30min to complete regardless (it does account for about 1/3 the total ISK, however). Without salvaging as you go (instead dropping MTUs for later collection) I think you could get the mission time for 1,3 and 4 down by about half, which means that with a bit of luck you could potentially break the 300m ISK/hour threshold. I ran the first set of 'Enemy' with Golems and I'm pretty sure that I could crank through the missions even faster with Rattlesnakes (or something comparable).

2.4b ISK, as I'm only utilizing PLEX for 2 of the accounts (the 3rd was prepaid for a year). So basically I only need to run this setup for 10-12 hours a month (or 2-3 hours every week, basically on a night when there's crappy television programming or nothing on Netflix). Personally I find this a lot more enjoyable and satisfying than tediously grinding and looting Lv4s or running Burner missions.

I wouldn't necessarily say a commitment of 2-3 hours a week is "a lot". And while PLEX is a recurring cost - I always have the option of shelling out cash to simply extend game time for between 1-3 months (or simply letting a character lapse if I'm too busy). As previously indicated, I manufacture my own ammunition which keeps the cost to a minimum (I pay for any material costs through Storyline missions, which I haven't included in any of the totals).

I can consistently achieve 125-150m ISK/hour just blitzing and shooting Lv4s and looting the occasional worthwhile mission. If I'm more selective with missions, 200m ISK/hour is definitely achievable. And if I'm really (really) picky and get a string of the "Enemy" missions, I can bank 250m+ ISK/hour if I really focus and pay attention.

You can make more ISK running Burners or Incursions in high-sec, L5 missions or Faction Warfare in low-sec, quite a bit in null-sec and obscene amounts in wormhole space. There are many other posts that delve into these avenues and since they aren't my area of expertise I'll leave it to those more experienced to comment.

This isn't a guide per say, merely some observations on what can be achieved if one is properly motivated. YMMV.