1) The skill requirement reduction is nothing more than dumbing down of EVE Online. EVE is renouned for its complexity and steep learning curve. Infact this is one of EVE's most appealing assets. A game for adults and mature people and it should stay like that.

They don't mention the support skills, only Mining Barge, due to the inherent ridiculousness of training a month to fly a Covetor and then a day or two more for a Hulk. There's nothing in the blog to indicate that it's their intention to strip out Astrogeology etc. at all. In fact they're more likely to add a skill, as they mention wanting ORE Mining frigate to IV to be a prerequisite as well.

With the planned changes to the exhumers, will they keep there current hull bonuses...(i.e: Macks bonus to ice mining..ect)...

If they won't be keeping those bonuses, can we expect new ore ships for those roles in the future?

Any chance of a t2 version of the new mining frig, and if so whats the intended purpose it?

I'd like to know if they are even remotely considering capital mining ships that you can fit strips to or if they are shooting the idea down for good. I know people hate the idea but I love it. :)

i think the most important question is: since ore holds cannot be modified by cargo modules/rigs, therefore will the hulk continue to be the largest total ore capacity ship out there? I'm assuming my 10k m3+ ice mining hulk will still be my bread and butter...i'd like to be wrong and see them come out with the AFK3000 O.R.E. barge - alas somehow i doubt it.

Q. Any hope getting more types of mining drones?

Medium and heavy seem logical. Perhaps limited to the specialized drone mining ship, if necessary.

Q. Any hope of the Orca ever getting one or two utility high-slots added?

Once the gang links are in, there is no room for a tractorbeam or two, and that really is a crime. An extra mid-slot for a scanner would be nice too, as a reasonably tanked Orca needs all the current slots.

I get the impression the HULK will have a 6,000m3 ore hold equal to its unmodified cargohold. and will probably have its cargohold reduced to a small bay for mods and crystals. But I could be wrong.

I haven't gone through this entire thread yet, but obviously specifics on intended changes to skiffs, mackinaws, hulks.

Will skiffs, mackinaws, hulks each be able to mine everything (gas clouds, mercoxit, ice, ore)?
Are mackinaws going to become worse at ice mining?
Are hulks going to become better at ice mining than mackinaws?

Need rorqual changes:

There are some much needed changes to rorquals to allow low/nullsec ice mining to be more agreeable than the highsec botting alternative.

- Rorquals need for compressed ice blocks to be 1/10th their size, and to compress at 10x their current rate.
- Ice compression in a rorqual is terribly slow, allowing a rorqual to only keep up with 4 mackinaws. (By contrast, rorquals are able to keep up with 20+ ore miners in terms of compression)
- Only a small fraction of compressed ice types are smaller in compressed form than their refined products.


Are there any plans to add a decent source of low-end minerals to low/nullsec?

Requests for changes to mining often ask for changes that will result in significant increases to yield throughout New Eden. These kind of changes are NOT required even after recent iterations such as removal of drone compounds etc. Mineral prices,in terms of high sec ores at least, have reached a level where imo mining is now an economically viable career.

The number one concern with the proposed changes to mining is the idea to reduce EHP on Covetors & Mackinaws. I'm not a suicide ganker but I personally feel that EHP on Covetors and Hulks is about right atm and does not need to increase either. If you are not afk and have fitted some tank then you will be relatively safe. New Eden is about risk and I think even speaking as a miner it is about right atm. If miners feel the need to fly something more sturdy and the changes for the Procurer go through then they will something more to their taste to mine in.

Provided this change to Covetors and Hulks can be quashed then the new dev blog won't completely ruin where mining is atm.

minerals in high sec are getting crazy. pyrox (high sec ore) is worth more per m3 than crokite (0.0 ore), yes, granted abm ores are still the top 3 ores per m3 (not that it means much for mercoxit but whatever roll with it). i just don't think high sec ores should be more profitable than null sec ores, it just feels wrong. like meeting a cute chick just to slide your hand down and finding some thing that makes you jealous.

where do people keep getting the idea hulks/macks are getting less ehp? what have i missed? nowhere does it say they will be reducing the ehp of anything, infact "Resilience: another point is to give some of them proper EHP not to be one-shot by anything that even remotely sneezes on them." says the direct opposite.

Forum just ate my post.

Brief reply to above criticism:

Nul sec minerals (Megacyte etc.) have always been priced higher than high sec minerals (Mexallon etc) and I see nothing wrong with that. Pyroxeres is mainly more expensive than the mainstream ores becuse it contains a trace amount of Nocxium in it once refined. But Pyroxeres is only available in some races high sec space and in very sparse amounts in Minmatar & Gallente high sec systems.

The 'resilience' spoken of in the latest ship balancing dev blog relates largely to plans for the Procurer which is rarely used by the mining community. If you read on to the section on Covetors & Hulks you will find it says they will be given 'little to average EHP'. This implies that CCP will decrease the amount of EHP on both the Covetor & Hulk under the mistaken belief that placing them in a fleet with some combat ships will protect Hulks from being ganked. Logic dictates this approach will fail miserably.

Requests for changes to mining often ask for changes that will result in significant increases to yield throughout New Eden. These kind of changes are NOT required even after recent iterations such as removal of drone compounds etc. Mineral prices,in terms of high sec ores at least, have reached a level where imo mining is now an economically viable career.

The number one concern with the proposed changes to mining is the idea to reduce EHP on Covetors & Mackinaws. I'm not a suicide ganker but I personally feel that EHP on Covetors and Hulks is about right atm and does not need to increase either. If you are not afk and have fitted some tank then you will be relatively safe. New Eden is about risk and I think even speaking as a miner it is about right atm. If miners feel the need to fly something more sturdy and the changes for the Procurer go through then they will something more to their taste to mine in.

Provided this change to Covetors and Hulks can be quashed then the new dev blog won't completely ruin where mining is atm.

A broken Hulk with less EHP just means Retrievers will be the preferred mining ship due to 1) better EHP, 2) Larger ore bays.

where do people keep getting this "hulk will have less ehp" thing from?

GÇóProcurer/Skiff: primarily made for self-defense. Better mining rate than the ORE frig, good ore bay, but capable of having battleship-like EHP.

GÇóRetriever/Mackinaw: made for self-reliance. Has the largest ore bay, similear to the size of a jet can, second best mining output but less EHP than the procurer mining barge.

GÇóCovetor/hulk: ore bay is identical to its current cargo hold, little to average EHP, but best mining output. Basically made for group operations when players have industrials and protection to back them up.

Maybe the bolded parts where it says the Hulk will have litle to average EHP?

Some randomness in mining would be an idea, have the standard asteroids, but introduce a 'Mystery' rock where you don't know what minerals you're going to get until it's refined.

Also, make it possible to mine ice in things other than barges / exhumers by introducing a miner for it and reducing the lump size but increasing the quantity needed for refining, eg instead of being 1,000 m3 and needing 1 lump, make it 50m3 and need 20 units to refine.

Give the rorqual some love, reduce the time taken to compress ice. On the other hand, if they get rid of off grid boosting then it needs a dreadnought type tank when in deployed mode, it costs more than a dread so needs the ability to defend itself against subcaps proper

Need rorqual changes:

There are some much needed changes to rorquals to allow low/nullsec ice mining to be more agreeable than the highsec botting alternative.

- Rorquals need for compressed ice blocks to be 1/10th their size, and to compress at 10x their current rate.
- Ice compression in a rorqual is terribly slow, allowing a rorqual to only keep up with 4 mackinaws. (By contrast, rorquals are able to keep up with 20+ ore miners in terms of compression)
- Only a small fraction of compressed ice types are smaller in compressed form than their refined products.

........
where do people keep getting the idea hulks/macks are getting less ehp? what have i missed? nowhere does it say they will be reducing the ehp of anything, infact "Resilience: another point is to give some of them proper EHP not to be one-shot by anything that even remotely sneezes on them." says the direct opposite.