I was reading some stuff about afk hisec mining on minerbimping.com, and I realised that despote all the 'ppeople shouldn't afk in eve', I don't think I've seen an explanation of why not.

I'm not talking about bots, I'm talking about Mrs Jones doing her ironing whilst her retrievers in a 0.7 belt with her drones out, or Mr Smith orbiting a roid large enough to fill his hold and then going for a poo.

I hear James going on about the 'right' way to play, 'actively' is how he phrases it, but I don't know why AFKing is bad. Obviously it's sub-optimal since someone can gank you, but apart from that aspect, I can't see any difference in its effect on the game from at-the-keyboard mining. Can someone explain?

Does he post on the forums? It would be nice to see a gamebalance-oriented (as in not ideology-focussed) explanation for his ganking advocacy, as it relates to AFK miners, not bots.

AFK mining is just a EULA-compatible phrase for bot emulation.

An AFK miner is functionally equal to a bot, there is no need to consider them separately. AFK mining is bad for the same reason that botting is bad, minus "CCP said so".

If you are aware of a way for miners to mine AFK with no third party programs 24 hours a day without being at their machines and managing cargo then I'm all ears.

AFK mining is just a EULA-compatible phrase for bot emulation.

An AFK miner is functionally equal to a bot, there is no need to consider them separately. AFK mining is bad for the same reason that botting is bad, minus "CCP said so".

I think most of us are not against afk mining.
What we oppose is the notion that many of those afk miners believe they are entitled to complete safety while being afk.
If you put yourself at risk you should accept the possible consequences.

In my experience, most of the people who complain about AFK miners used to be AFK miners themselves. And then they got ganked, so now they complain about it...
TL;DR, Haters gonna hate

As long as youre not botting, there is no difference that I can see. If you have combat drones out that can handle any rats before your shield falls off, by sitting at the PC all your doing is staring at sod all that requires your input.
You COULD be chatting on Corp, offering assistance in HELP, planning new builds or ways to send your mining income, but honestly, there's only so long that any of that will hold your attention.

In its current form, non-fleet mining in high sec invites AFK behaviour, 3 minute cycle times, very large ore holds etc. My underskilled miner in a Retreiver can pitch up at a belt, pick 3 suitable rocks then be left completely alone for 30 minutes. If your managing multiple accounts then there may be enough to keep you busy, but for a one-man outfit .....

Its not fun, its not engaging and its CCPs doing.
For the record, I dont mine in High Sec or anywhere else anymore as its not worth the time if i'm not in a fleet with other people.

I dont want CCP to add another one of the god-awful mini-games they are so in love with atm either. I just wish they would make Mining engaging and at least worth the tedium.

James and his ilk are only interested in easy kills and provoking "tears". They are only unique in that they came up with a big enough justification to maintain momentum.

I think most of us are not against afk mining.
What we oppose is the notion that many of those afk miners believe they are entitled to complete safety while being afk.
If you put yourself at risk you should accept the possible consequences.

When I was young and in a highsec indy corp, I guess I was the only person who was not afk during mining OPs.
I was the stupid fool who actually tanked his barge, kept it aligned and watched d-scan. I know that some other guys in corp were playing World of Warcraft during those Ops. And since they did not tank their barges, they had more mining upgrades fitted and were thus making more isk/hour than me.

I'm not talking about bots, I'm talking about Mrs Jones doing her ironing whilst her retrievers in a 0.7 belt with her drones out, or Mr Smith orbiting a roid large enough to fill his hold and then going for a poo.

Because if you haven't realized it yet, EvE is a ganking game.

In WoW it's level 90s camping level 10s.

(Then folks wonder why WoW is the #1 MMO? It's because folks can chose to be anything but cheap kills).

PvP is the cheapest programming, why it's the default in all these "hands off" management games. They don't have to hand tweak raids or dungeons for example. They allow the players to make the content. The hands off manner also brings in all the faults of that model, because the changes players want...remember it's "hands off"?

So what we got here is an example of a cop out meeting another cop out.

James and crew are but those level 90s ganking level 10s mining copper. They're so bored that that's all they have to do. The shinier ships are hard to take down, and those people have ISK to wardec the PvPers into oblivion. So they pray on what won't fight back, and CCP provides it in ships (in a PvP game mind you) without good defenses or for that matter any weapons. CCP's answer is always watch your back, or if you can't replace it don't do it, and stands back.

It doesn't stop the botting or IsBoxers (which in the scheme of things not really different, just one's automated with it's own routine). Just like in WoW PvPing the bots. Tomorrow there will be more, and they'll die off the NPCs (I have pic of a bot in WoW and counted 10 skeletons exactly in the same place). They don't care, as they're still going to make ISK.

So all James is doing is what NPCs have already done. What's funnier they even act like bots they attack. Same routines, same victims, over and over and over. Wouldn't be surprised that they'll bot it even, after all the miners can't fight back anyhow.

Broken system meets another broken system.

I don't understand why you act like it's a bad thing that we attack "what won't fight back", especially considering a lot of these ships are expensive, plenty of them are profitable to kill, and some even have very blinged out fittings making them even more valuable to us.