I see all these threads about people trying to make mining more of a passive isk maker and increasing hulk tanks and bigger and better ships to make mining easier.

What they really should do is make mining harder, make it so less people do it, so then mineral prices rise, causing it to be more profitable.

I guess people want to make it easier so that it balances out against the boredom or AFK'ing. That and to compete against bots.

People probably want to just increase hulk tanks as a reaction to all the hulk/miner killing recently

I am acutally one of the ones on the other side of the fence and want to make it alot harder.

But making it easier won't make it funner, also it's already extremely easy.

No but making it harder (more profitable) makes up for the fact its boring as hell. Theres no way to make it more fun, not without making a whole little mini-game out of it

Full Officer fit CNR's get ganked in hi-sec. You can't tank a hulk enough to stop a gank. You can however make it harder to farm them.

You see it as 'making it easier to mine'.
The miner sees it as 'making it harder to farm him'.

It's all about perspective.

I see all these threads about people trying to make mining more of a passive isk maker and increasing hulk tanks and bigger and better ships to make mining easier.

What they really should do is make mining harder, make it so less people do it, so then mineral prices rise, causing it to be more profitable.

Step 1 Make System wide belts
Step 2 Make asteriod ambigously unknown
Step 3 Add several dozen new grades of each asteriod.
Step 4 few of the included grades are 'worthless' with lower than normal refine rates and 'dangerous' vareity of rocks that react very badly when mined.
Step 5 sit back and watch the miners complain they have to think on mining.

I see all these threads about people trying to make mining more of a passive isk maker and increasing hulk tanks and bigger and better ships to make mining easier.

What they really should do is make mining harder, make it so less people do it, so then mineral prices rise, causing it to be more profitable.

If we had skills to train up that reduced the amount of time it took to complete a mining cycle then mining wouldn't be as painful.

However, CCP and every other MMORPG company seem to think that in order to make an MMORPG you have to make every single task as boring and tedious as possible so people stay subscribed for longer.

Also, if you had a mining focused character because you found mission running even more tedious like I do, you wouldn't have needed to post in this thread or create it, or even argue the point, because you'd know how boring it was already.

I want an increased cargo bay that is all.

I don't want to make it easier. If they are war decc'ed or can flipped and scrambled, they are going to die. I just want them to live long enough for any alliance or corp members in the area to have a chance to respond and defend their friends and assets.

That could and probably would lead to more PVP from escalation.

Step 1 Make System wide belts
Step 2 Make asteriod ambigously unknown
Step 3 Add several dozen new grades of each asteriod.
Step 4 few of the included grades are 'worthless' with lower than normal refine rates and 'dangerous' vareity of rocks that react very badly when mined.
Step 5 sit back and watch the miners complain they have to think on mining.

Well, I think the real question is: What part of mining do we want the majority of effort to be concentrated? The actual act of mining the asteroid, or finding the good stuff and logistics.

The problem is that miners have gotten used to being able to gather resources and make money while not actually playing the game...something no other "profession" in the game is able to do (without violating the ToS).

You're asking for increased yield. Won't happen because it won't increase income, just depress prices.

Yes, trust a corporation member from 0.0 space to make that kind of comment :)

If you knew anything about economies you'd realise that one of the reasons that EVE Online and MMORPGs in general is the fact that they conjure up currencies from thin air which is mathematically and realistically impossible, our economies RL are heading the way of EVE.

If I'm going to be forced to work long hours for nothing in a sodding game as well as real life I at least want the game version of it to be as painless as possible. Also take a look at the economy you have in 0.0, it's nothing, this is what will happen when you try and nerf and gank industrial players off the servers, you won't be able to even get basic tech 1 ships anymore.

The difference between EVE and RL is that in EVE CCP can change up a simple bit of code that they already have and make the situation a lot better, realism is boring and it sucks, that's why we have video games and other forms of media to make us happy.

Oh and I just thought of a fantastic idea to fix the problem of depressing prices and CCP will be one of the first to do it, I'll write it up in features.

I'd say the general consensus was that mining wasn't fun, not that it needed to be easier.

I want an increased cargo bay that is all.

The problem is that a lot of people understand this wrong...

Most people would love to trade the afkness for far more isk. For example introduce a minigame that you have to play while mining that makes your yield far, far higher, but forces you to actually constantly play. That would make you mine more = earn more isk.

The problem of mining isn't that it is to hard. It's just extremly boring AND even if you try hard to avoid all criminals, it's simply NOT POSIBLE.

There is no way to secure your ore against can flippes with their cloacked pets backup (fail game mechanic).

There is no way to fit enough tank to survive long enough until rescue arrives (FAIL slot/cpu/grid layout of all ming ships). Hey, I totaly except, that the have close to no offense ... but defens? Every engineer with a bit of brain will pack defens even more, when they know this ship will be prime of any pirate! And every company with a bit of brain (ORE) would fire an engineer, who present them a ship designe WITHOUT defens!
[/quote}
In RL do any of the largest mining machines have defensive armament? The 2x MLU Hulk has very little useful tank because it give everything up in order to achieve maximum yield. Fit for tank and the Hulk's almost respectable. But if you want to be able to survive a PvP encounter while flying a hulk...

[quote]
All over mining atm is just mega frustrating .... and it's no wonder so many use BOTs to do this job.


What? Ask buddys, if they protect you while you mine? LOL!
Sitting at gates waiting for targets is mega broing.
Camping stations is braindead boring.
Mining is super boring.

Sitting in a belt doing nothing but watching someone how he mines ... would YOU do it? For sure not! And you would show everybody who tell you to do your mid finger followed by the F...Y...-words.

Over all:
- meachnic need revamp (not more simple, not more effectiv, MORE INTERESTING)
- ship designes need revamp (not more effectiv, BETTER TO DEFENS)

Your frustration with mining probably stems from you being terrible at it and not having figured out that, just maybe, shooting someone in a Combat ship while you're in a *Mining* ship isn't such a good idea.

The fleet warfare has changed to where to field a huge REPLACEABLE fleet you need 100s and 1000s of times the amount of minerals. But the ability to mine these amounts hasnt increased with the need and the availability of techniques to "mine"; be they with a barge, with guns or through reproing loot and are ironically being nerfed as they can be and will be automated because of sheer ease of doing so.

This is just part of the problem.

The market demand more minerals.
Mineral offers increased to do more players AND drone regions, loot refine and bots.
But the price peer mineral doesn't stay the same or rise ... it drobs to points, where ACTIVE mining by players is the worst you can do to earn money in addition to it's massive boriness :(.

There are several points which need a very close look from the DEVs.

I see all these threads about people trying to make mining more of a passive isk maker and increasing hulk tanks and bigger and better ships to make mining easier.

This isn't necessary. Anybody who is actually playing the game while they are mining (as opposed to afk mining while watching ****) can stay aligned and warp out as soon as a ganker warps in. The problem is that miners have gotten used to being able to gather resources and make money while not actually playing the game...something no other "profession" in the game is able to do (without violating the ToS).

If we want the prospecting/logistics to be where the effort is then we should go with a more passive system where the skill of mining comes from being able to find the good ore. Then once it's found, the miner places and configures a small structure at a belt and that does the mining for you. All you'd have to do is haul the ore when the structure fills up. The number of structures per player would have to be limited so as to prevent them from becoming like GSC's are now.

Since the actual effort goes into finding the ore, we would need a new prospecting skill and module. The module could work like a combination of the on-board scanner and a probe launcher. You jump into a system, run the prospector scan to see what's in system and what approximate quantities/concentrations, then if the system has what you want, launch a prospector probe or three and get to the business of pinning it down. This should work a bit different than normal anomaly scanning, maybe more automated or something just so that we don't have to probe down every asteroid we want to mine.

Couple of things about the passive method though. 1) As Nova suggested earlier, it would be necessary to add in a good number of new types of ore beyond what we have now because prospecting for something that's easy to find is a waste of time. And with only 16 main types of ore, prospecting wouldn't have enough variation to be interesting. 2) This might have a favorable impact on botting because the advantage bots have is negated when everyone can mine 23.5/7 and are limited to a certain number platforms.

This is similar to the idea I had. Mining really needs to be re-thought from the ground up; I know I'm not the only person with Exhumers V who hasn't touched a Hulk in ages.

... , like a dedicated gas harvester (not the best idea), ....

Why does CCP hate miners?

Why does CCP hate miners?

I bolded your ERROR there.........

It has nothing to do with making it EASIER. Have you ever actually mined a thing ?

Have you ever actually manufactured one single item in-game ?

Has NOTHING to do with EASIER (Jebus F'in Christ on a Stick), but what to do about the infantile mindset that achieves ORGASM at the pop of a paper bag.

Certainly Hulks should be killable, but not THAT easily.

Gankers are the ones who already have it SUPER EASY.

GANKING is TOO EASY, not mining. Mining is fine.

Keeping my eyes open and scanning for gankers is PASSIVE ?? IT IS NOT EASY evading ganks. Takes skill, derrrrrrr.......

I'm never AFK mining BECAUSE of ganking possibility, but feel free to pop those who are, and the bots. It is EASY to tell who is and who isn't. Use your brain.

People will gank freighters if they want to. The only hulks that get destroyed regularly are the ones that chose to not tank. Unless you're in a .5 system, there's no reason to get ganked by anything that is smaller than a BC.

Unless you're in a .5 system, there's no reason to get ganked by anything that is smaller than a BC.

Sorry, wrong.

When I started I tryed mining like most causal player. Mining frig -> Arbitrator -> T1 barg -> T2 barg -> 00 mining -> WH mining and never lost a singel mining ship. So I can't be that terrible, can I? I just stoped as it's BOOOOOOORING to pay for sitting around doing nothing but watch (often) bugged mining lasers and/or drones.

And sure, when you earn 200m/h you can pay people to protect you (as good as posible). But that's not the case (nor was it when I started, so don't know about 2003 when piracy and can flipping was no problem) anymore.

Becouse of all the bot mining, drone region loot and normal loot you are lucky, when you reach 50m/h even in WH/00 (counting all the afford to get the ore to trade hubs).

And you can't be seriously compareing rat BS to player BS. That's just a bad joke! Who cares about rats when mining?
A singel T1 cruiser is enough to kill a T1 mining ship (see all the Ruptur vids/mails) with 1 to 3 shots. That's FAR away from 3 BS! And 1 to 3 shots isn't even even enough time for remote armor reps to get a single cycle through!

How does introducing randomization make mining more interactive? Since you can't actually tell what grade you're mining, it doesn't matter. You just vacuum up everything and hope, since nobody will grab a little of each and jump back to refine and check. (Because that's even less fun than what we have now.)

[3. Nope, I'm saying that no mining ship (fit for mining) should be able to survive any decent attack by a player combat ship.

3. Nope, I'm saying that no mining ship (fit for mining) should be able to survive any decent attack by a player combat ship. So beyond being able to tank BS spawns, it doesn't need more tank (tank doesn't keep you alive when under attack from players, killing them does).

EDIT: If you've never lost a mining ship, why are you complaining about its tank? RunAwayTanking your Hulk is working as intended.

Ever........at ALL ???

WHAT is your INSANE justification oh MIGHTY EPEEN One ??????????????

Enlighten us all please why a CERTAIN ship class absolutely should not be able to survive ???

What RL situation is equivalent in the least ?????

No industrial company would put ANY equipment at that kind of risk.

My bitterness is, that is TO EASY for highsec gankers.

I buy a TECH 2 ship for 400 MILLION ISK without fitting, with fitting it can reach 1 BILLION easily.
And a stupid nobrain wannabe e-peen sucker without real life just need a damn T1 ship for less then 100 million WITH fitting where half the slots are empty (guns+4 ups REST EMPTY) to destroy it in seconds WITHOUT any changs to survive => 100% and total balance FAIL!!
And that's in HIGH SECURE SPACE where Concord should handle this sorts of criminal actions.

If Concord can't get in in time ... how the **** should a player be able too??
Concord reacts in 10 or less seconds. A mining barg needs MORE time to alligne! And no, staying at full speed is NO OPTION. Same for faction mods which would make them just a more likely target!

In addition, every time there are one or more stupid kids, which try to give fail by intend advises like "fit tank, don't mine when XY happens bla bla bla" ... I wish to see YOUR reaction, when someone tells you, to NOT do what every you want to do at any time. YOU would collaps this forum with all your pink baby whining!

1) ANY ship must be fitteble by using just common T2 mods WITHOUT fitting mods (ak no CPU, no grid upgrades!)
Every sucking cruiser fit includes LARGH T2 shield extender ... but a TECH TWO cruiser size ship can't even fit T2 MEDIUM?
Just a realy REALY bad joke from CCP!
No ship designer with brain would construct such a bullshit of a hull!
Either nerv combat ships so that anything but BS+ size is UNABLE to fit largh extender/1600mm plates OR buff bargs and haulers so they can fit the same mods!

2) Other ore resurces (drones/loot) must be overhault to bring profit from this profession in line again!

To the guy above,

Player protection is nearly just as useless in todays situation with hulks popping faster than the gaurds could respond. Fully tanked out hulks cannot withstand suicide gankers in today's envrionment either.

If you want to prove me wrong, goto the gallente high sec belts and get ganked in that hulk you thought should have survived.

Matter of factly I challenge you to counter the gallente belt ganking to the point the goons leave you alone there.

Also they do make amored bulldozers its time eve got the equivalent.

And no its not a shovel protecting against an ak-47 which some are quite capable at doing vs regular clothes. Its a shovel protecting against an RPG which doesnt work on any degree (then agian alot of traditional armor doenst work against an RPG either as rpgs basically create a nuclear explosion on the other side of the armor they penetrate.)

and Ill agree with gunminign needs to go. Metalevel Blueprints and the additional meta-level parts needed to build the module to drop instead.

So I should be able to fit a doomsday on my Ibis. Gotcha. Ships make up for fitting limitations in other ways (ever see thorax pull in 3k m3 of ore in 3 min?).

Why would you want to punish player success?

With this you disqualified yourselve.

Ibis == titan hull yes yes
combat ship thorax mining == mining ship coveto dishing out 500+ DPS

troll more

People like you are the one, who destroy any reputation for real PvP players with your FAIL comments.

But Titans are ship hulls and all ships should be able to use the same modules. You're complaint was that the Hulk's powergrid is tiny. My point is that it's big enough for strip miners and enough tank to survive even the toughest rats. That's what it is designed to do.

And with this you displayed all of us, that you understand nothing OR just want to troll.
Read again.

CRUISER fitting ability == CRUISER fitting ability
MEDIUM moduls for MEDIUM hulls

This is what I demand!

But I do any bet ... you don't care but just want to troll more.

My point is that it's big enough for strip miners and enough tank to survive even the toughest rats. That's what it is designed to do.

Anything tanks rats. Proves nothing.

I don't take your comments out of context, I'd ask you to afford me the same courtesy.

The Defensive buffer modules don't have sizes. They have fitting requirements. In fact if we start at the top and match ship hulls with tank mods:
LSE -- Battleship
MSE -- Cruiser
SSE -- Frigate
MicroSE --- ?

If we go from the bottom up, or we include Battlecruisers, it gets worse for your argument.

If we accept the premise that tank modules have sizes that relate to ship hull sizes (which I don't accept), then the fact that combat ships can fit oversized tanking modules shouldn't bother you.

Your Hulk's ability to tank belt rats means it can mine anywhere with complete safety. It's the other players that are the problem. And that's how a Multiplayer Sandbox works. You build a sandcastle, I can knock it down. But then you can knock down my sandcastle. Even further than that, you build a sandcastle, there's now less sand (or space) for my sandcastle, and the only way to make more space is to knock yours down.

Well, I don't care, if a Caracal can fit TWO LSE ... but it's just a bad joke from you, to claim "mining ships shouldn't be allowed to use ONE MSE at the same time".
And that's what you do!
This just let one conclusion: you try hard to troll and claime balance to your favor (ak WANT INBALANCE).

From the link "I gank your barg, you gank my POS ..."
So you EXPECT and FORCE every one to wast their training time (SP) for combat skills just as YOU want it this way.

Some player do NOT want to be fighters.
So who are you to FORCE them to be one?

There's a very good mining ship that lets you fit a fair tank (including your magic LSE) and pulls in more than 2/3 the ore a Hulk does. It's the Rokh.

The size of the hull is irrelevant. The role of the ship is what matters. Claiming that cruiser hulls should have access to the same fittings is ridiculous.

Why are you in a PvP game if you don't want PvP? A Multiplayer Sandbox with a Player driven market is a PvP game regardless of whether there's any shooting.

You joined a dark, harsh, and lawless game (as it is advertised) and now you're complaining that it's too dark, harsh, and lawless?

Again the balance is simple. Massively increased hull HP.

A) Forces miners to equip a DCU if they want to have a better chance to survive against lower cost ships.

B) Forces miners who have been attacked to sit and use a slow hull repair system (This can be further enhanced by a 50 percent hull repair amount penalty granted to the mining barges encouraging use of remote hull repairs)

C) Is an easy system to implement.

Again the balance is simple. Massively increased hull HP.

A) Forces miners to equip a DCU if they want to have a better chance to survive against lower cost ships.

B) Forces miners who have been attacked to sit and use a slow hull repair system (This can be further enhanced by a 50 percent hull repair amount penalty granted to the mining barges encouraging use of remote hull repairs)

C) Is an easy system to implement.

Adding slots, CPU and grid to get compareble defensive fittings like combat medium hulls isn't more work then your hull increase.

PS: and why do you want to pre-gimp them again with repair penaltys ???
Absolut no reason for this!

Miners are no second class players! They pay the same real money for their playtime. And as they do so, they DESERVE the same posibilitys (wtf repair penalty????).
CCP would be stupid to handle them as second class custumers!

At the moment EVE clearly favors piracy and ganking by making it easy enough that even a monky can do it.

B) Forces miners who have been attacked to sit and use a slow hull repair system (This can be further enhanced by a 50 percent hull repair amount penalty granted to the mining barges encouraging use of remote hull repairs)

There's a very good mining ship that lets you fit a fair tank (including your magic LSE) and pulls in more than 2/3 the ore a Hulk does. It's the Rokh.

The size of the hull is irrelevant. The role of the ship is what matters. Claiming that cruiser hulls should have access to the same fittings is ridiculous.

And Mining is what, Hard?

certainly more expensive

At the moment EVE clearly favors piracy and ganking by making it easy enough that even a monky can do it.

Monkey's do.

At the moment EVE clearly favors piracy and ganking by making it easy enough that even a monky can do it.

I disagree.

Right now the cost for a successful hisec gank is extremely low. To fix this adding a massive boost to hull HP will mean more DPS needed and thus cost before concord arrives.

It should take an expensive fit Oracle or Tornado or Naga (Or a group of smaller ships) to destroy a hulk with a damage control system before concord arrives in most situations. The hull boost WILL do that.

For ganking, which is TOTALLY legal........cost is 200,000,000 per ship Ganked.

You can have your FUN.....but at a PRICE.......................

the supply of minerals doesn't come mostly from mining (it's reprocessed mission/drone loot) for starters, so the effect of changes to mining itself is a more complex disucssion...

they dont need to make mining harder- just the process of mining harder- in order to eliminate the bots- which can be done

Really? Can you link where you got this info? I'd really liek to see it.

1. Remove the re-processing of modules and ammo. I don't like it. It makes no sense to get back the minerals when their molecular structure has already been completely changed during the production process.

They should sell "bot scripts" on the market for mining.
The more expensive one can have you dock up for safety and such... IE, the m ore the script does the more expensive it would cost. Plus maybe a mod that would allow you to run the script.
Player must be logged in to active bot script...
Its not like its already a bot controlled industry.

Apostrophes are hard.

Mining is a PvE activity in a non-consentual PvP game. Mining is not for providing mineral resources (that's what reprocessing and drone poo are for).
Working as intended.

The player guard should already be in belt with you. And if you fit your hulk with 2 cargo expanders and 2 expander rigs, aligning out at 70% speed will be long enough to fill your cargo. Is it efficient? Not in the least. But it's safe.

we should have an asteroid that makes us cloak and look like veldspar, then when the miner activates his miner on us, he gets concorded.

i always wonder: how it can be that "pvp-players" can discuss how it some battle stuff is overpowered or underpowered (BUFF HYBRIDS!!!!) and at the same time they can advice "forget about any efficiency, fit tank" to miners?

would you tank your stealth bomber? Or maybe you passive armor tank your interceptor?
Or maybe you fit your drake with blasters? LOL?

So why do miners NEED TO DO the same?

What you guys need is a counter for gankers ...
... not making mining easier / making ganking harder.

Oh and ... great, the 6th billion thread about this topic.

I don't see why you bring bombers and interceptors in to this, since it works against your point. People don't tank bombers or interceptors, since they know they aren't supposed to tank well. They focus on taking advantage of their strong points and keep alive by avoiding taking heavy fire. If they want to tank, they use different ships, that aren't as good at doing the things bombers and interceptors are good at. There also aren't people asking interceptors and bombers to have the ability to tank ships focused on direct combat. They accept that if they get caught or make a piloting error, they will die horribly to almost any other ship in seconds.

Miners in contrast aren't willing to make the same sacrifices. They want that maximum mining yeald ship, that can also tank like a champion. They have trouble accepting the fact, that one ship shouldn't be able to do it all and that there are always sacrifices you make to achieve peak performance in another area. A 8 turret BS is a nice mining ship with a huge tank and the insurance pay is good, but for some reason it doesn't seem to be an option for miners. I could also support a branch of more tanky mining ships, that are less efficient than hulks or mackinaws, but are capable of fitting the same modules. That way you have a clear option between tank or mining efficiency and no one but yourself is to blame if you make yourself an easy gank magnet.

Here's an interesting thought: Let's make the T1 mining barges into the tanked miners. Don't panic, I'll explain.

Let's say you want to design a good, all-around mining ship. It needs to be able to handle combat, so you give it a good tank. Because if this, it doesn't get as good a mining yield as it could and can't fit as many mining modules (maybe prevent them from taking T2 strip miners, for example). So you've got mining barges, your all-purpose miners that have decent tanks. Then someone takes those designs, strips out all the armor to increase cargo capacity, changes up the slot layout to handle more mining-related modules, and tweaks the system to support high-end miners. It's a purpose built miner that would sacrifice tank in favor of efficiency.

This would mean that the covetor would be your top-end tanked up miner, while the hulk would be the one you pull out when you know it's safe and you want higher yield and more cargo capacity. Then it becomes a CHOICE as to which ship you use, rather than "I can fly and afford a hulk, therefore I will use one because no other miner is superior in any way."

As for aligning out: get two hulks, fit webifiers on them, and web each other. You can align out to a station or safe spot and cruise at very low speeds, mining all the way. It's just a variation on the webifier trick used to bring haulers to warp faster. Get creative, people!

Here's an interesting thought: Let's make the T1 mining barges into the tanked miners. Don't panic, I'll explain.

Let's say you want to design a good, all-around mining ship. It needs to be able to handle combat, so you give it a good tank. Because if this, it doesn't get as good a mining yield as it could and can't fit as many mining modules (maybe prevent them from taking T2 strip miners, for example). So you've got mining barges, your all-purpose miners that have decent tanks. Then someone takes those designs, strips out all the armor to increase cargo capacity, changes up the slot layout to handle more mining-related modules, and tweaks the system to support high-end miners. It's a purpose built miner that would sacrifice tank in favor of efficiency.

Well yes you can gank 500k ehp ship if its worth it..
People shooting exhumers for fun..

If the Covetor were to get a buff and finally match the tank of its T2 counterpart (at the expense of yield), then the Orca and Covetor will be a perfect match instead. The Covetor already offers a cheap price for its design since it only requires base minerals for production. After all, a lot of players use it during Hulkageddon anyways to cut their loses, so why not buff them a bit? That way, I can finally dust off that T1 barge I had stored in my hangar all this time.

the main problem (which you don't see for some reason): is tanking mining ship completely kills its role.

Let's speak about SB. SB is a small fast frigate with ability to fit big weapon and covert cloak. You can fit some kind of tank to it with speed modules, damage control or something.
Let's say now: to complete your job (kill your target) you need 150% of your cargohold. Or you will need to dock and refuel after your attack to make next shot.
This is what you want from miners: put tank into ship and make 2 attacks instead of 1. Don't forget: hulk fills its base cargohold in 1 cycle (3 minutes). Then it needs to spend 2-5 minutes to warp out/dock/undock/warp back to belt.

Why advice "stay aligned" is bad.
Proper align needs your ship to move with (let's say) 70m/sec speed towards some object. Let's say your laser hits asteroid up to 20km. So how much time you have till you get out of range? You have 5 minutes. Then you need to turn towards next object and pass your asteroid again for like next 5 minutes. (Here we speak about ICE mining).
And now get your BS to nearest belt and do this for like 1 hour. Then return and talk to us how fun is it?
And you want miners (HUMANS!) to do it. Or you want bots?

You're halfway there. I'm saying nerf the hulk's tank while buffing the covetor's. It should be a choice: mining barge for tank, or exhumer for yield and cargo capacity. There's no reason a hulk should be able to carry significantly more cargo than a covetor UNLESS something else were sacrificed for that cargo space. If necessary, the yield on the hulk could be increased so that it was still considered a worthwhile investment in spite of its fragile hull. It could be something as simple as changing out one mid slot in favor of a low, allowing for more cargo or mining upgrades.

If the Hulk were to suffer from CCP's infamous Nerf Bat, then let it be restricted to removing one mid slot for a low slot for an additional MLU. On top of that, it may need an additional CPU/PG upgrade to compensate for the third MLU. There is a reason miners want to fly a Hulk and that is for the maximum efficiency in yield. The tank is actually alright considering that a single Catalyst can take down a Hulk in 0.5 space so long as the Hulk is fitted with anti-tank mods like cargo expanders and/or optimizers. A naked Hulk with moderate skills has about 8,000 BEHP (less if the skills are basic and cargo mods are added).

This reminds me, the Covetor is overdue for additional slots. If it's going to be buffed for better tank, it better have more slots.

Personally, I think this could work. I think the Hulk is perfect for now. I mean, it's perfectly designed to mine efficiently while also providing the option to tank it to the max with modules at the expense of mining yield. The Covetor would be the primary option for those looking to use a cheap miner they are willing to sacrifice in live events like Hulkageddon; therefore it is a good option to buff. But for now, the Hulk is the only mining ship that is Built. Ford. ORE. Tough.

Currently, one can fit a Hulk to have 29,000 BEHP (Base Effective Hit Points = before overheat, fleet boosts, shield reps, etc.). That alone is enough to discourage gankers who can't afford to sacrifice a tier 3 BC or a T1 BS. The Orca, which usually accompanies a Hulk or Covetor, can tank with at least 230,000 BEHP. Alternatively, the Orca can also be fitted for maximum capacity and increased yield at the expense of its tank.

Option 3: Eliminate regenerating 'public' asteroid belts and increase the rate of Grav site spawns to compensate.

So many side effects nerfs and runarounds. Geez folks the solution is simple.

If it is a mining barge it gets a MASSIVE hull (Not tankable shield or armor I mean HULL, STRUCTURE) HP increase.

To be honest I suspect some of you keep pushing the "Give em more slots or shield HP!!!!1" not because of ganking but because you want your mining ship to be able to tank 0.0 belt battleships without having to fit an expensive fit on your hulk.

The hull boost WILL fix the issue. Look at the orca!

Thank YOU for the great response. Combine that with the scannable 'roids only idea..........

My opinion is that to gank a hulk should cost 100M+ to the attacking party plus the usual standings loss. Increasing hull increases the cost to gank a ship in time. That is called balance. Covoters obviously cost far less so the hull increase is far less.

I am also pro moving roids to grav sites. That encourages grouping for use of scanner ships.

I have proposed the "free to GANK in High, but for 200,000,000 ISK per ganked ship" idea in another thread.

'Cost To Gank' and 'Scannable only Roids and Ice' seems to be the way to go.........

We don't need core gameplay changes we don't need big changes at all.

Seriously folks. Hull HP boost. And its DONE. What is so hard to understand about that?

We don't need core gameplay changes we don't need big changes at all.

Seriously folks. Hull HP boost. And its DONE. What is so hard to understand about that?

Won't. Stop. Ganks.

It doesn't matter what you do to mining ships, it doesn't matter what you do to miners. People don't like you.
I don't know why people don't like miners or mining, aside from it being painstakingly dull, boring and a waste of
time; people just don't like you.

Sorry, but the facts of life are: someone must mine to make your ships.

We no mine......we make-y no shippies.......you no fly-eeeee.

Then no game-ey.


F--KIN' THINK ! Oh, wait......................

Good-bye.

Sorry, but the facts of life are: someone must mine to make your ships.

We no mine......we make-y no shippies.......you no fly-eeeee.

Then no game-ey.


F--KIN' THINK ! Oh, wait......................

Good-bye.

The tier 3 bcs do encourage ganking but why even use them when cheapo destroyers can gank a hulk these days?

No it will not stop ganking. But it will stop the slew of easy ganks.

You want to spend 100M to fit a Tornado and gank a hulk have at it! Yet it should cost atleast 100M to get a hulk.

Hull HP is where it is at.

You boost only the survivability of the craft in short term bad situations such as a gank. Try to use that hull HP to tank PVE and the tears will be delightful.

I agree that changing drones to bounties would be for the best in that regard. However when that happens the issue is only going to get worse with the stark difference between cost to gank and cost to ship and fit.

It should be quite distant but not THAT distant. A good fit dessie popping a hulk before concord arrives? You HAVE to admit that is wrong. Boosting hull HP means that dessie would die before he could deplete the hull HP and thus requires more of them or an expensive bigger craft.


It would reduce the amount of cheap ganks and atleast make the ganks that do happen forum post worthy.

No it is not. Not in the least when you consider the micro cost to fit said LOLfit.

Massively boost the Hull HP and that ship goes back to extreme 0 tank combat ship popper like it should be or even better requires Wolfpacks of said ships to encourage grouping.

Sorry, but the facts of life are: someone must mine to make your ships.

We no mine......we make-y no shippies.......you no fly-eeeee.

Then no game-ey.

The issue with removing mining altogether is that there are people that strangely enjoy it or use it as a low stress way to make funds.

1. Drone Poop is a huge mineral faucet

In NULL.

Go after THEM.

The Drone Poop in High is PATHETIC.

Please GROW brains...........PLEASE.

^I agree.

Isn't it interesting how the people who argue against the rebalancing the mining profession or making the ships harder to gank, are as a majority the type who hate mining. Hate it because of the boredom or low pay... it's not their play style.

Their arguments are based on their play style. That's why they can't understand I guess. They can't come to grips with the idea that the type of player who likes mining doesn't enjoy the things they do.

I like alloys in high sec .. it makes me sad that it will get removed eventually.. But than again new faction modules and other loot + bounty.. uniqueness is gone.. however being unique is not always for the best.

Those alloys are pathetic in amount in High Sec. Waste of ISK Earned/Hr.

Ok enough of the null and hisec group comparisons. We need solutions such as my boost hull HP idea.

In NULL.

Go after THEM.

The Drone Poop in High is PATHETIC.

Please GROW brains...........PLEASE.

'Tis a curious, almost psychopathic phenomena.

Personally, I don't care WHAT people do ingame, I hate not one profession over another. IT IS A SANDBOX !!

And where on Earth in their tiny little minds they get this infantile notion to 'hate' another's playstyle...personally IT IS NONE OF THIER BUSINESS.

Do Devs check the "Features & Ideas" in the forums or should I post "another idea for changing the mining mechanics" here in this thread or in another thread in EVE General...
Because I see a lot of threads here with devs but not there.

The Dev's post in the F&I forum threads with *good* ideas. They post in the GD forum threads with F&I Content pretty reliably:

"This Thread has been moved to F&I"

People do. The Gunminers rat aligned and GTFO when threatened. Thus they have adapted to the threat of being ganked. Why is it too much to ask hisec miners to adapt a little?

Drone poop dropped in Null is an issue for all of EVE as evidenced by the fact that it killed mining income in *all* of Eve.

The base value of maxed out Hisec PvE is l4s at roughly 50m/hr. Something that falls below this needs a buff, something that trends above it needs a Nerf. (Mining maxes out at ~10m/hr, Incursions max at over 100m/hr. Both need alteration)

The base value of maxed out Nullsec PvE is anomaly farming at roughly 70-100m/hr. Something that falls below this needs a buff, something that trends above it needs a Nerf. (Mining maxes out at ~20-30m/hr clearing hidden belts (which you have to), and nothing really trends above that)

Drone anomalies in Null provide more mineral wealth (measured in m3) per hour than mining in a maxed out, Rorq boosted Hulk. They also produce a very high proportion of high ends. This means they directly compete with mining and they're strictly better at it (except Trit). This is probably not great for the miners of Eve.

GREAT, so you don't mind that some people's profession involves blowing up your ships while you're working on your profession. You're OK with the suicide ganking status quo, and as such you understand the idea behind Eve.

I do indeed like the challenge of avoiding ganks. Mining would be TRULY boring then.

Issue is IT IS TOO EASY. That's all.

If you read the 'gankers' posts, you will realize their objective is utterly UNREALISTIC and INFANTILE: TO WIN ABSOLUTELY EVERY SINGLE TIME !!

It is CLEAR this is the goal.

I am acutally one of the ones on the other side of the fence and want to make it alot harder.