EVE - Just returned, a bit lost in space

[Bradster]

Greetings,

It’s been a few years, six to be exact. I’ve recently returned to MMO’s after a very long break. Decided to resume with EVE.

This weekend I setup isboxer and doing the trail on that. Great for window management, very smooth, quick transition. Much better than the good old hardware days of doing things, I approve!

Right now I have 6 toons, only 5 of which are a “team” the one will always be separate.

Right now I have the following setup.
Maxed Orca Pilot
Miner - Hulk
Miner - Hulk
Miner - Hulk
Logistics – Wait huh?
I did have it setup for 4 miners but I found the micro management to be a bit too taxing for me to keep up and still passively watch a movie while mining. That and high sec gankers I felt the best choice would be Logistic support. So I have an Osprey perma repping the 3 hulks cap stable. Plus I have the orca repping the Osprey. Basically a spider tanked mining fleet, lol. While by no means a guarantee not to be ganked, it’s a great deterrent.

That said I’m finding the income to be low, surprising low. When I played Mineral prices were quite different. Now the Isk per hour ratio is pretty bad doing a high sec belt. My miners will be able to use T2 Crystals pretty soon which should help. But I can’t help but think perhaps my time is best worth performing other tasks outside of mining.

Perhaps I’m in the wrong area. I’m only finding Veld, Pla, and Scord. (I’m in minispace).

I have seen Jaspet/Omber sites on D-Scan but time I find it it’s almost gone, or the ore distance is spaced out way too far to be worth wild.

Moving forward I would appreciate any suggestions on how my time could be better spent.

I really enjoyed hard DED complexes in null back in the day. But the logistics, contacts and friends to live out there just aren’t available to me this early on just coming back. Plus I’d rather not deal with that until I’m acclimated with the game and changes again.


Thanks :)

[Redbeard]

Hi Bradster, welcome back.

For quite some time now high sec mining has been pretty abysmal as far as making money. If mining is your long term goal I would definitely consider it a stepping stone and/or an alternative where you want to be able to mine in relative safety (though as I am sure you remember, even in high sec if you're undocked you're never safe).

I know missioning brings in much better money. There are other options too that I dont know too much about so wont speak to them.

Lastly, dont be focused on the "level' of the ore. I havent looked at the numbers lately, but depending on prices, a lot of times veldspar or scordite are the best high sec available ore to mine.

Hope that was marginally helpful.

Again, Welcome back!

[Starbuck_Jones]

If I wanted to get into EVE would I be better off getting a starter pack or resurrecting my old account from 2005? I have no idea what is on that account if anything?

[EaTCarbS]

mining is really only worth it in null, plus you can supplement your mining income with a healthy dose of PI. I'd also argue that null mining is safer due to the lower amount of people around. You know when someone is there to shoot at you :D

[Redbeard]

Have to balance with the barrier to entry (which is lessened if you have other lovely boxers inviting you to join them), the fact that if you cant kill the belt rats your operation can come to a stop, lame ass cloakers hiding in your system, all out war potentially, etc etc.

The risk of being unable to "play" (if you just want to mine) is much less in high sec.

Thus, the reward.

Might give null a go myself this time.

[Grondir]

I liked being in null sec, sure every now and again you get a camper, but the rewards are much better.

The only thing is it started to feel like a second job. My play time is limited due to a busy work schedule. And having to make up ore/ice quotas from a missed corp op started to mean I never had any playtime to myself.


Null is great but it can be a big commitment

[Bradster]

For the record I have done null, I used to live in Road kill space, it was wonderful had many stations I could care bear it up doing DED plexs and rat. Made tons and tons of isk. Then go out and PVP when I wanted to, which I often did as well. But mainly just a handful I do not like large fleets. 30v1 isn’t fun (to me). However the time I was an interceptor fleet of 30 and we killed a freighter, I have to admit that was funny. I took a break from game and then started multiboxing wow. When I came back Roadkill was no more. I think RED kicked them out. I know I’ve suffered the wraith of a Dooms day titan, talk about 1 shot lol, think that was on a alt, don’t remember. Till that disbanded and was taken over. But I mined out there too. Great stuff.



I also lived in Prov for a while. I didn’t like that much, never knew who to trust.



I used to mine in low sec a lot, were talking years ago, may have seen 3 people all day come in (was a dead end system). Way before faction wars. Then Eve-Uni moved in to that pipeline and ruined it. Couple days ago I visited that system, didn’t see Eve-Uni and did a DED4 there, (no luck on a good drop) but It was nice to see it was just down to 12-15 pirates which was more of what I was used too, I might have to revisit the idea down there once more.



Most of my time in eve was spent war deccing Indy corps. A friend and I would collect intel, would only a target a corp that had a pos with something to gain of value for blowing it up.



Once the wardec would happen everyone would dock up and we’d head out there, once in reinforced we would ransom, Faction tower typically 1B was the ransom price the tower being 800m (least at the time) and they have all those labs sitting in there and no station in system you know BPO’s are in there. Most of the time they paid. If not we’d make some isk off of the POS mods, got quite a few ships, never any BPOs worth bragging about tho. But lots of Killmails.



Here’s the 3rd PVP video I did, http://dl.eve-files.com/media/corp/Chimay/chimay3.wmv (http://dl.eve-files.com/media/corp/Chimay/chimay3.wmv) Couple 1v2’s in there all solo stuff. I start off in my myrm killing a command ship and a Battlecruiser you can see from the preview. You have to download it.


Anyway I digress!

I came up with idea, myself that I’m going to try. If this fails I may fish for an invite for the null sec life once more. But my idea is this. Worm holes. Never really gave this a go. I setup a tower for a corp once, but never got to PVE there, no sites any time I scanned it.
I’m going to start with a C1, I’m not going to put up a tower. I have a ship fitted ready to go. Going to scan me one out and see how that goes. C1 I’m screwed trying to use a barge so once I get my feet wet I’ll try a C2 and if I can do that solo I’ll put up a small tower just to park the ships in. Then I can mine the grav and do the gas sites. But before then I have to experience Worm hole life, make sure it’s a good fit, perform the discovery on the PVE side of things on how to make it. From there if It goes well I’ll have to mine ice for a while, get a couple months stock going with my alts and get gas harvesting trained up. Then build some barges and gas harvest ships and I should be good to go!
Looking forward to this new experience so I’m excited. Had to work late on a project tonight and have to be a client late tomorrow so I think it will be Thursday before I can go hunting for a C1 worm hole.

[Bradster]

I had a bit of a frustrating night on eve, I didn’t loose anything. But basically failing my goals for the evening.

Picking up where I left off, my intent was to try Wormhole space. I undock from my station and within 2mins I found a C1 wormhole, now that’s just plan luck!

Had a ship fitted ready to go. Fit can be found here.
http://eve.battleclinic.com/loadout/67794-Gila-Solo-C1-Wormhole-Anom-ISK-spinner.html


The fit had everything needed, Probes to find my way out, salvager and a T-beam to help things along on looting.

Didn’t see anyone active in the WH after watching for a while. I did an anom, took a while. Kept getting agro on my drones which really prolonged it, a great deal. Looted and salvaged everything and made about, say 11m from the encounter. Not bad for my first run.

I then began clearing another anom, which point the locals woke up I saw a large incoming fleet on dscan and got out of there just as they landed on grid. Kinda sucked because I killed half the ships invested the time and didn’t have the opportunity to loot and salvage for the time investment.

I returned to high sec and began scouting, in the process found me a DED3. 4m in loot, 5 rooms, big time sink on that thing, just luck of the draw it’s the way it goes.

Found another C1, started the site, mid-way through again, saw a lot of activity on Dscan, decided it’s best to move on. Least this time I looted and salvaged while shooting so it wasn’t a total loss. Also this being the second experience I can see so far this fit will work for solo exploration and doing sites in C1 WH.

I found a couple Worm holes along the way that were active. Then I found, I believe a C2. There was only a couple combat sites to do, there was a tower in there off line. No corp array to blow up sadly.

Using the same Gila ship I cleared the first wave and a BS spawned, I had to warp out 3-4 times. Finally downed that and another came. Because the recharge rate on that fit is low took a lot long breaks to charge it back up to continue. The fit after all is designed for a C1. Finally after being in that site for 45mins and armor at 50% (this is a shield tanked fit) I release the time investment to finally down this battleship and the next couple waves after would take the entire night. I returned to high sec, entered low sec and found me a DED5, All righty then my favorite!

Grab my CNR close by, parked a cloak alt by the gate to watch it going in the DED plex. Clear 2 rooms, couple locals came in, which I remember from years ago I use to tangle with these guys all the time. Wasn’t long before a large fleet jumped in after they scanned down the site. I was off like a prom dress ship in tack before they even reached the first gate my alt was sitting at. I saw the probes, I knew it was coming I was aligned and ready at least.

At which point I returned to my home system. Time to research more on Wormhole life.

As of right now, being a week night and level of traffic and interruptions this simply isn’t going to be efficient or work. It appears finding a WH with a low sec static would see less traffic logically so that’s the next step. But first I have to find me a C2 Solo fit that includes probes and way to salvage.

That’s where I came up short on options. Still looking but it appears I’m going to fall short. Doh.

Sat in the station for the last hour bored wondering what to do, lol.

[EaTCarbS]

A few folks on here are in a WH corp/alliance, you should get in contact with them if you really want to do WH living. I imagine C1s are kinda rough due to the amount of traffic.

[Bradster]

Good idea!

You know something I didn't think about until the next morning was. If I selected a WH with a lowsec Static. If I intend to mine with my alts I'd need to use a Orca to move it outside. Big slow, lowsec, Orca. All bad things! Vs. High sec status would be perfectly fine, in fact I'd just use a freighter in that case.

Did some research the other night and fit a couple ships to try out. Last night, I almost had what could of been a really nice gank.

I fit a drake for C3 and put a scan probe luncher on it. I setup an alt in a destroyer with Tbeams and Salvagers to go with me. Perfect 2 man operation to try out! Anyway I jump in this WH I found, turns out its a C5 but as I jumped in a hauler cross jumped me. I quickly jumped back out. Sadly I didn't have a point fitted to the drake. I tried bumping with the destroyer. He just got away. I bet that thing was full of C5 loot. That would of been one rowdy kill mail lol.

Afterwards me and the guy joked about it, it was so close!


I think in the end of all this i'll end up back in Null space living. But I want to give this a go for the experience at least.

[Bradster]

Also during my exploring last night I saw much activity with haulers in WH's. I fit myself a Oynx. Next time I see activity i'll grab it and hope they warp to me :)