The only thing I think is wrong with the Procurer/Retriever hulls is the bonus should be a skill bonus rather than a role bonus.

What's wrong with the Procurer having a +40%/level bonus to strip miner yield?

the hulk still is the superior yield ship

What you suggest would just keep the hulk as king of mining and not change a single thing with the rebalance, the other two ships would be useless.

The only thing I think is wrong with the Procurer/Retriever hulls is the bonus should be a skill bonus rather than a role bonus.
What's wrong with the Procurer having a +40%/level bonus to strip miner yield?

I did not say that the new bonuses to mid & low slots, extra cap, extra ore cargo, extra drones, etc should be done away with at all! I'm just saying that 1 strip miner should not be directly equal to 3 strip miners, that is all. You did not read my numbers.

I think your idea is reaonable; maybe the numbers have to be tweaked, but yes those who skill up should be rewarded!

i did read your numbers, and even at exhumer V it'd still have the lowest yield, and until exhumer V it'd be an absolute joke in terms of yield. the idea is terrible and the numbers are worse than the idea. sorry but that's the truth of it. the skiff is already the most pointless of the 3 mining barges without neutering it further.

+40%/level of Mining barge puts it at +200% at Mining Barge 5, then it *could* have an exhumer skill bonus as well.

As to it having the lowest production? That's the tradeoff for it having the biggest tank.
This is what people in the business refer to as "game balance".

sure it's balanced, doesn't mean it makes the skiff a worth while ship. it's still the worst exhumer out there.

That entirely depends on what you are doing with it.

I certainly wouldn't recommend it for secure fleet operations, for exactly the reason you note, but if I needed to take a mining fleet out in lowsec it would definitely be high on my list.

see, you're mining in low sec.... why would any one do that?

in terms of mining, low sec is more redundant than the skiff.

Lowsec is redundant in many ways, but we've got it anyway and it does have its uses.

Same with the skiff. I've found good uses for even the old skiff, the new one will have different uses.

low sec has it's uses, mining isn't one of them.

the new skiff has uses, mining isn't one of them.

in short, low sec mining sucks and the skiff's going to be relegated to cyno bait.

OK Dave please explain how the Skiff is worthless as a mining vessel, I am curious

OK Dave please explain how the Skiff is worthless as a mining vessel, I am curious

Yeah they suck so badly I am changing all my alts from Hulks to skiffs. On a quick play on SiSi, I easily had 86k ehp and mining about 25% below a hulk. So I don't have to worry as much about loosing a 300 mill ship. Lets face it at 300 mill a pop it really takes out of the profit margin if you get ganked.

for a start it has the lowest yield. the ore bay is mediocre meaning you're wasting lots of time docking up or you're jetcan mining, in addition with the removal of it's +2 warp strength if you get tackled outside of empire space then you're dead regardless of your ehp and in empire space the hulk and mackinaw [especially the mackinaw] appear to have enough ehp to deter most destroyer flying suicide gankers from even bothering.

in relation to other options the skiff is in a very weak place. i feel even some thing as simple as the +2 warp strength being returned to it would drastically increase it's value.

The only difference in mining yeald between the skiff and the mackinaw is the mackinaw can fit a 3rd mlu, other than that there base yealds are the exact same. I do agree that the +2 warp core strength is necessary to calll it a deep space mining vessel but on that same note, none of the barges have a boost to warp core strength so that is a moot point. If any of the, are cought in deep space they will pop, with the large amount of ehp you might be able to call for some back up before you die. The ore hold is not great but it is not that bad either, it is good to jump into a belt mine a couple cycles and get out, it is not a extend operation ship. One thing most dont realize is that the skiff is stilll going to be the cheapest exhumer.

Even as a miner, I don't think mining should ever be as profitable as mission running; we don't face much direct attack, (aside from T2 crystals), we don't have to spend ISK for ammo, & can perma-bookmark where ever we go. Really to make that kind of money, one needs to invest into making stuff with ore... Let's face it, mining is what you can do while checking emails & watching TV at the same time.

You proved exactly why the Procurer/Skiff should not get all the extra forthcoming bonuses; considering training time + hull & fitting costs, the overall "inherit desirability" should go 3rd, 2nd, 1st, not 1st, 2nd, 3rd like you have listed.

Hulk is being kept as a base line, which is fine. The lower-tiered hulls are getting new bonuses, which is great & needed IMHO. However, I think it is imbalanced to give the lowest tier a boost to make it overshadow the other more expensive (in money & time resources) ships!
edit: For reference for mining amount numbers, please see this post: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=1716186#post1716186