When you ask anyone who plays EVE Online, what the game is like, the immediate response is “EVE is a PVP game“. This short sentence is both true and false, depending on the point-of-view. EVE Online players rarely admit to the fact, that part of the game success is it’s player-driven economy. Those who don’t engage in PVP, and instead run missions, mine asteroids or make money in any other way are considered inferior and called “carebears” by the self-assumed “elite” players. The truth is, if EVE had no economy and everything was supplied by the NPCs, this would most likely hold true. Truth however, is not so simple.
The War Machine needs fuel!
The eternal conflict in New Eden needs fuel, and that fuel is ships and armaments, which players use to blow each other up. Manufacturing of most goods in EVE requires minerals. With the Escalation to Inferno changes (removal of mineral drops from Rogue Drones), and further nerf of meta-0 loot, the only valid source of minerals becomes, again, mining.
“Mining?! u kidding me bro? It’s boring as hell and gives no kills. And it pays almost no ISK. And Tech II ships that we elite pvpers fly don’t need minerals, right? They only need moon goo. Everyone knows that.” – said the elite pilot
“You know jack shit about how stuff is made.” replied the carebear.
“STFU*, noob! You know jack shit about PVP.”, said the angry elite egger.
Guess what? It’s our carebear, who is right in this case. Due to the Tech II manufacturing mechanics, Tech I items are still neccessary to build their Tech II versions. They are simply one of the materials used for manufacturing. What this means is, every ship in the game is made of minerals, doesn’t matter if this is Tech I, Tech II or a faction ship* Those minerals have to come from somewhere.
Without the carebears making ships, PVPers would fly Velators and Reapers and shoot civilan guns. We don’t want that, do we? Both playstyles are necessary for EVE Online to thrive.
*) faction ships are made from BPCs or require a Tech I ship trade-in.
Here come PVPers again.
Ganking can be a rather lucrative business. Killing juicy haulers in high sec is just as easy as anywhere else. The only difference is the presence of CONCORD, but it does not prevent killing. Instead, CONCORD ships only deliver a punishment by destroying the offender’s ship. Ganking can also be done for fun. Guess who’s the easiest target? Miners.
Mining ships are not even half as resilient as their combat counterparts, making them excellent prey.
“You forgot to add that carebear tears are sooooo delicious!”, said the elite pilot.
As a pilot who has been on both ends of suicide ganking (been a piwate once, but I’m teh good guy now!) I can throw my two cents.
The defense against suicide ganking is rather limited, except for simply not flying these vulnerable ships. Carebears have everything against them:
- very limited EHP of Exhumers and Barges
- element of surprise on gankers side
- low agility makes it difficult to warp out quickly
- Destroyers are cheap and powerful enough to blow up Exhumers and Barges
- There is no defence against alpha volley, except for EHP
With that in mind, instead of whining to CCP for EHP buff, we can make ganking harder, by fitting the mining ships accordingly.
First, a few things that *will not* protect you:
- Having friends in BS/BCs or even Falcons: because gankers rely on Alpha strike – the first volley which is usually fired the instant they lock your ship. This gives friendly pilots no time to intervene.
- Active tank: neither shield boosters, nor armor repairers will help, exactly for the same reason.
- Warp Core Stabilisers: because of long align times and quick alpha strike – this module is completely not viable for mining.
- Drones: they will not have enough time to destroy the attacker, but if you fit for EHP and survive a gank attempt, Drones might give you a killmail 😉
Fly Barges instead of Exhumers
Players can easily offset the high cost of a Hulk by using a Covetor instead. With the current mineral prices, the difference between Hulk and Covetor mining output is not that much, but the difference in prices of these two ships is huge. Here’s two samples of a “Resilient” Covetor fit:
[Covetor, armor]
Damage Control II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Residual Survey Scanner I
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
Medium Trimark Armor Pump I
[Covetor, shield]
Damage Control II
Adaptive Nano Plating II
V-M15 Braced Multispectral Shield Matrix
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Both setups offer about 12k EHP, which is… well… still not too much. But it is over twice as much as an untanked Covetor has, and it takes more than a single Dessy to kill it.
Please keep in mind, that mining in a Battleship is not a bad idea as well.
And if you really have to fly a Hulk…
Tank it as much as humanly possible! It will not guarantee 100% safety, but it will either discourage potential gankers, or even make you survive a gank (if bad guys don’t scan your ship before attacking it). When fitting a Hulk these days, survivability is the key word. Here’s an example:
[Hulk, Tanked]
Damage Control II
Reinforced Bulkheads II
Small F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Small F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal II
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
This setup offers 27,1k EHP, which is much better than untanked Covetor (5,5k) and untanked Hulk (9k). With someone flying a booster Tengu or Vulture in the fleet it might even be enough to actually combat gankers.
[Hulk, Tankit]
Damage Control II
Micro B88 Core Augmentation
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Medium F-S9 Regolith Shield Induction
Limited Adaptive Invulnerability Field I
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal I
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal I
Modulated Strip Miner II, Veldspar Mining Crystal I
Medium Core Defence Field Extender I
Medium Ancillary Current Router I
The above setup (credit goes to Jorma Morkkis) gives 28,8 kEHP (32,8 with overheat). It will be rather hard to get it past this point without the use of faction/deadspace mods.
But what about Orca?
Orca is usually used as a giant hauler with Mining Links. This makes most people fit Orca with Large Cargohold Optimization rigs and Expanded Cargohold IIs. These players score their own goal, because both rigs and expanded cargohold mods reduce EHP. Comparison is quite simple: Tanked Orca offers 278,8k EHP versus 64,8k EHP of Cargo expanded Orca. This requires many more than 5 Tornadoes to kill. The choice (and the risk) is, of course, yours.
[Orca, Tank]
Damage Control II
Reinforced Bulkheads II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Heat Dissipation Field II
EM Ward Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Mining Foreman Link – Mining Laser Field Enhancement
Small Tractor Beam I
Mining Foreman Link – Laser Optimization
Large Core Defence Field Extender I
Large Core Defence Field Extender I
Large Core Defence Field Extender I
PS. The fitting above has more EHP than a Freighter.
Stay out of plain sight
There is one last idea to make mining a safer task: mining in Gravimetric sites and mission deadspaces. Of course gankers can scan, too, but you will notice Core/Combat probes on directional scanner long before the bad guys can warp on top of you. The rules are the same as for missioning/mining in low sec: watch local and watch directional scanner like a hawk, warp out at the first sign of trouble.
Use some out-of-character PVP skills
Staying aligned at 3/4 of max speed makes mining more difficult, but can save your life. Also try to have the destination station as selected object at all times, so all you have to do is press the “warp” button. Incoming ships are visible on overview a few sceonds before they can be a threat, but in order to see them, you will have to set up two tabs in your overview. Make one of them show asteroid (let’s call it “mining” tab) and the other one – ships (let’s assume its called “pvp” tab). When you pop a roid, switch to mining tab, lock a new rock and start mining it. Then go back to the pvp tab. Have the pvp tab open at all times. When you see a cruiser or destroyer warping in, just hit the warp button. Remember to have the station (the one you’re aligned to) selected at all times.