A Scientist's Life in Eve

So I logged onto Sisi, the test server, last night to play with the new mining barge changes.

My intention was to fit up each of the Exhumer ships for maximum mining, and then see how tanky I could make them.  First off, I’m not using a mega mining character with perfect skills, so these aren’t EFT warrior fits.  Also, I’m not claiming to be any sort of authority on how to fit ships, simply that I’m fitting ships how I would normally and how it seems to work, within the constraints of my knowledge, character skills and ship fitting constraints.  Also, with one exception, I’m not using Pith X-type this or Estemel’s Modified that to make the tank silly.  I’m fitting it to be able to take some damage, but on the knowledge that this is Eve and that I will probably lose the ship at some point, and that a 1 billion ISK Hulk is not worth me flying as it will take so long to repay it’s cost, and that ISK could have made me many times that in return through other industrial activities.

As a note, the character has Exhumers IV and Mining Upgrades IV.

So on to the ships.

As a comparison, I have my current Hulk fit.  I have nerfed the mining a bit because I’m using T1 strip miners and only one mining laser upgrade 2 (MLU2) in the low slots for fitting purposes.  It has an EHP of 15.1k due to having:

[Hulk, Current Hulk]
Mining Laser Upgrade II
Mining Laser Upgrade II

Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Thermic Dissipation Amplifier II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Domination EM Ward Amplifier

Modulated Strip Miner II
Modulated Strip Miner II
Modulated Strip Miner II

Medium Processor Overclocking Unit I
Medium Processor Overclocking Unit I

Note the exception, the Domination passive shield resistance amplifiers are around 33 million ISK, and given the overall value of the ship I think they’re good value to provide that extra tank and remain cap stable.  Another variant would be to drop the Thermic Dissipation Amplifier II and put a Small C5-L Emergency Shield Overload I shield boosting module on which allows me to run for 1 minute 40 seconds when under heavier DPS, but reduces my EHP by around 1K.  This allows extra time to tank rats while waiting for drones to clear the rats or for somebody to arrive and kill them for me.

So… that’s how I am at the moment, how are things going to be post update?

First up let’s compare the modified Hulk.  For all of the below, I’m not going to comment on the mining outputs, as the Hulk will still outmine, but only in certain circumstances.  Why, you ask? Because the Hulk at the moment can have the biggest cargo hold, whereas post update it will be down to ore holds, which are not influenced by cargo rigs or expanded cargohold modules.  This will leave the Hulk the go-to ship for Orca supported mining operations, but for anything else a new favourite will emerge – for me anyway.

Also, for all the fits below, I’ve added a 3% Energy Grid implant in slot 6 and a 3% Shield Capacity implant in slot 7.

OK, the Hulk – here’s a screenshot of my first attempt at a new fit.  Remember, for all fits I went for maximum mining output from modules, and then added rigs and tanking modules afterwards.  You can therefore take it as read that the high slots will always be Modulated Strip Miner II’s and the low slots will always be MLU2′s:

As you can see, I’ve got fitting rigs, and then in the mids I’ve got:

EM Ward Amplifier II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Thermic Dissipation Amplifier II
Domination Kinetic Deflection Amplifier II

This gives a very similar EHP of 14.3k.  However, I’m down a few hundred from the passive fit I use currently, and up a fraction from the active fit, but without the active module.  Of course in all cases, you’d fit appropriately for the rats if you were in 0.0 space, and probably an omni tank in hi-sec to help prevent ganks.

This has an ore hold of only 7,500m3, which isn’t great and needs an orca there to make it work.

Next up is the Mackinaw:

As you can see I have the travesty of an empty mid-slot.  The other mids are:

EM Ward Amplifier II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Thermic Dissipation Amplifier II

Fitting rigs are needed again, and I’m very tight on CPU as can be seen.  However, the EHP is a very nice 27.7k, and the ore hold of 31,250m3 is just amazing.

This is the ship I will be using for mining from now on, as most of the time I’m mining without Orca support, and the fact I’ll be able to stay there for longer means I lose much less time warping around and more time harvesting rocks.

Finally is the Skiff:

I will immediately own up to the fact that I don’t fly a Skiff at the moment.  I haven’t trained the skills to use the Mercoxit mining crystals, and so at the moment it has not point for me.  However, look at the fitting possible!  No fitting rigs at all.  The mids are:

Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Medium F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Medium F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction

and rigs are:

Medium Anti-EM Screen Reinforcer I
Medium Core Defense Field Extender I

This gives a massive tank of 67.5k EHP along with an ore hold of 17,500m3.  Bear in mind that this fitting is for maximum mining yield.  I’ve been told that non-mining fits can achieve tanks in excess of 100k EHP – crazy.

The bonuses for all ships have changed, leaving the pure orca supported mining output as Hulk > Mackinaw > Skiff, which is how you would expect and hope things to be.  The tank used to follow this, but is now reversed to Hulk < Mackinaw < Skiff, which is very interesting to see.

Also, Skiffs lose their Mercoxit mining bonus, instead there is a new rig, the Medium Mercoxit Mining Crystal Optimization I.  This gives a 16% bonus to Mercoxit Mining modules.  Interestingly there doesn’t appear to be a T2 version on Sisi at the moment.

As to Ice Mining, fitted with 3x Ice Harvester Upgrade II’s and 2x Ice Harvester II’s, it looks like (before bonuses) I can mine 2 blocks of Ice every 180 seconds with the new Mackinaw.  Although I have CPU issues and have to nerf the tank further to do this.   This compares with (again unbonused) my current output of 4 blocks of Ice every 310 seconds.  So, a quick bit of maths shows that my old Mackinaw produces one block of Ice every 77.5 seconds, whereas the new Mackinaw will produce 1 block of Ice every 90 seconds.  A 16% decrease in output.

EDIT: Following a comment I have been alerted to the existence of the Medium Ice Harvester Accelerator I rig, although it is not available for purchase on Sisi at the moment.  Just one of these rigs reduces cycle time by 12%, so two of these rigs, combined with the new format Mackinaw should result in a good result for Ice miners everywhere.  It would have been nice to actually fit two of these rigs to my Sisi Mackinaw to check for stacking penalties etc., but the signs look positive.

This again will throw up some interesting possibilities for the future.  Ice Mining will in theory be less productive, however with the new bigger ore holds and more tank on the Mackinaws, it might be worth leaving the Orca in the hanger and pulling another Mackinaw out, as long as you have an Orca or Rorqual somewhere giving bonuses already.

It will be really interesting to see the variety of fits after the update, and also to see how all this affects the bots and the normal miners, and therefore the Eve economy as a whole.

Next year maybe it won’t be Hulkageddon, although Mackinawageddon doesn’t really have the same ring, does it?

DISCLAIMER: My fitting knowledge and skills are probably worse than yours, and therefore if you do decide to troll my fits, please note that I am just really throwing these out as general illustrations of what could be possible, and more to highlight the differences between the new versions of the ships and the fact that I fail at fitting.