Missions & Complexes

Do not be disappointed about lack of skills limiting your options for exploration in the first couple of weeks. I really enjoyed reading the blog Mnemosyne mentioned, that explains early options. There is no need to sit in the station till the skills are better.

You can do a lot with an Imicus .. just stick Hobs I in it and train to Hobs II as soon as possible and go for highsec radars. I still use my Imicus for quick scanning trips rather than a covops because it is so versatile. An Ishtar is my next goal.

If you want to try some plexes, keep a dps cruiser or BC' close by. Alternatively, ask a corp mate for some dps support for shared rewards. Lots of options. If you wanna speed up scanning and you stay in highsec (you should for starters) invest your money from the first couple of Radars in sisters probe launcher, sister probes and grav rigs. It helps a lot.

Whatever you do, just enjoy the excitment of exploration .. new unknown sigs with imaginable rewards are waiting for "only" you just around the corner ... no, not this corner .. the next one :)

Since blog was written and it is about 1.5 years now few things are different now, not only price of Plex.
First of all, skills training process became way much faster because no more need to waist time on learning skills. It means that you will spend a bit more time on making ISKs actually. Another change makes big difference for new low skilled prober char. Now all probes contribute to scanning result, not only 4 with best result as it used to be. To make it even CCP reduced signatures strength. Therefore, I noticed that deviations of scan results is lower with 7 probes than with 4. It means that with more probes in space you will have more precise position of signature and less cycles of reposition probes. It may not be a big deal for skilled char, but for rookie prober it means reduced time for nailing down signature of interest. Yet another great thing CCP implemented is gravity center for probs moving with "Alt" pressed.

As a result of all changes mentioned above, scanning process became faster and getting scanning char is ridiculously easy.

Finally we have 3/10 for Guristas and it not only drops A-Type small shield booster but other "Dread Guristas" stuff like launchers or rail guns quiet often, compare to 4/10 when you can eventually get Gila BP (1% drop rate).

All this are positive thing and they can easily contribute the difference of only 100Mil between Plex prices differences now and then.

The bad news is than exploration is not mini profession any more. It became like a EVE hobby for everybody and his mom. The thing is that difference between "I want to be explorer too" and few real pros is very little in terms of scanning abilities now. So you have to compete against armada of hi sec explorers, typically in Tengu. And it is a huge difference to what it used to be 2 years ago. (and pretty much the same trend in low sec).

But exploration in hi sec still extremely profitable if you can find ways to run it effectively. I run radars in hi sec only when I cross them hunting 3/10 or 4/10. But I still make ISK out of them on regular basis.

On a final note, my little report of my last 5 days Guristas hi sec plex hunting (approx 2 hours of active scanning every day):

4/10 - 8 : 3 Medium Shiled Boosters, 2 Kin, 2 Expl and 2 Mag Amplifiers.
3/10 - 10 : 1 Small Shield Booster, 1 Worm BP.

It is about 1.5 Bil or roughly 120-150 mil per hour across a board.

Does it mean you can get the same with Imicus from radars? Now way, but I still confident you can make enough for PLEX in 2 weeks.

P.S.
By the way, I made about 3 times more ISK in low sec in last 6 days.

What ???? Apologies to OP .. but I need to ask 5nipe here without starting a new thread: "Do you suggest to drop the Ishtar idea?", 5nipe???. Do you mind to explain why? My entire career planning for 2012 in question here (Imicus-Vexor-Ishtar-Gila-Tengu)

Having flown all those and also a proteus, the tengu is just in another class. 700 dps at max range with about that much tank. Most frigs get 1 shot and cruisers usually take 2 volleys, sometimes 3. I do spend a lot of time managing my launchers to avoid 'wasted' shots, but still just a minor annoyance and totally worth it.

Vexor -> Ishtar
Arbitrator -> Pilgrim
Gila -> Tengu

with pvp prospective (except the case of 0.0 rifter rookie pvp starter kit) I will go for Arbitrator.
Even Tengu means Falcon.

Ishtar has no single significant advantage over Gila for exploration (even price tags are about the same) not in short run, neither in long run.

And this is all last few post about, not that there is no world without Tengu.

I was not talking to the OP, but the other poster who admittedly went OT. Also I totally agree, you don't need a tengu to explore. I was just giving the poster my opinion based on my experience with those ships.

I beg your pardon, but I haven't went OT. I just pointed out why such ship as Gila would be good choice as "Beginner exploration ship and fitting " compare to Ishtar and why it makes sense for long run (Tengu). And I have answered direct question why Tengu better that Ishtar.

I can write a wall of OT advices about my Pilgrim low sec 4/10 and radars ISK printing machine, and it would not be "Beginner exploration ship and fitting".

my 2c.

Could you please post the Tengu fit for all of this?

I think I have most of the required skills for it.

Souls Rei - a cruiser can handle any high sec radar/mag sites, and most low sec radar/mag sites. There are some sites that throw lots of ships at you, but they are usually in waves as you begin to tap the site cans. So you can control the waves by clearing them before you hit the next site can.

If you are gonna go with a drone boat then you really do need above average drone skils, which will take longer. Course, if you go with a gun boat, then gunnery skills. There is always something to train!

Just go with what feels comfortable, start with 0.6 and 0.5 systems, work the combat sites too, get the feel of how your ship is working, maybe tweak it if needed, then head into a 0.4 system and below. But you will need more than a cruiser to work the low sec combat sites.

It is true that mag sites are not as good loot-wise, but supposedly they beefed them up in the last upgrade. I have noticed a bit of an improvement. I would still hit the high sec mag sites, which usually have no rats at all. Even some low sec mag sites have no rats. It all adds up.

Happy Exploring!!

Fro

Thank you for all the replies, honestly, you can go OT as much as you want as long as it's related to exploring, i do not care since i am learning a lot from them.

I hit some WH in HS, i read some articles about them. Sometimes, you might not be able to come back, or get killed by other players. Let's say, i am in my Vexor which can clear every site in HS. Is the risk worth it to explore them? Or are they very dangerous, even in HS? Keep in mind that i might not be able to afford losing my brand-new-super-relatively-expensive-fully-fitted Vexor.