- YES! Give Alphas more features, including cloaking and mining drones.
- NO! Time to roll-back the skill pool for Alphas.
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There is a third option.
No changes necessary.
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Naw, Alphas need to be rolled back and hit with the nerf bat. This botting/ratting fiasco in null-sec may be the final straw.
The math for some of it functions but the Gila part doesn’t.
You mean the Omega botting fiasco?
Yeah…
You are just getting way crazier the longer you tilt at this windmill
You don’t have to take the r/Eve article at face value to realize that there’s a huge issue with botting and cheating. The ability for Alphas to run many kinds of ratting ships (Gila, Rattlesnake) is exacerbating the problem.
Did you just use the slippery slope argument…
Nerf alphas. They keep crying they want more access. Show them how well they already have it for free. If they want more they can do by following how the game is built; by paying and waiting.
With alphas getting more and more access there is less and less need for an omega account. Few omegas means more micro transactions leading Eve ending with something like a loot box.
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That I did. But when you just start randomly declaring we need X without a reasoning behind it we end up with X is now Y, is now Z, is now AA. Goalposts get shifted, so we’re not talking about the actual benefits of the mining drones and why it should be a non-alpha skill which CCP did not add to the list they get access to. The same way that barges are not free to use. The same way T2 ships of any kind aren’t free to use.
You want the higher end content and CCP wants the server to keep going so they can continue to make a profit. They caved up to battleships (and pirate factions) to free use. Personally think they should have cut it at Cruisers. And the main argument for basically boils down to I want more free income.
Barges aren’t T2’s but they would be wanted when that 2 mil isn’t enough additional income. Not why that 2 mil will really increase the retention rate of miners. Mining is a nitch in the game. If you aren’t interested enough to subscribe to increase your mining then mining isn’t really the problem. It’s the wish for an additional isk faucet. They already exist. I’ve been doing them in two different formats. On an alt earning LP and ISK when I feel like doing Distro missions without much effort because i’m busy, or on my main mining in a venture. Why do I say venture? I’m currently in a time bind so I’m not able to play like I normally would. I could earn way more by subscribing or plexing. I know this for fact. So would the mining drones magically change my ability to plex or subscribe at all? No. The income is pittances compared to ice mining incomes. You’d still have the massive flaw of an ore hold which fills in under 15 minutes. So 5k holds are the issue. The way to get around this already exists with battleship mining and jetcans with a fleet member to pick the ore up as a fully stacked battleship could easily outmine the Venture.
A Rokh or Apocalypse or Maelstrom with 8 high slots. The Megathong with 7. These are greater incomes which Alpha clones can access but the negative is the cargohold. So why are these not more important than access to the drones which you already have access to as an alpha clone? Because it makes the game not solo for you.
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Sounds like a good idea to me. We’d need to make sure alphas can’t create a substantially superior mining ship to a Venture, but if they have alternate options that are roughly equivalent that is good and fun.
They already can. The alpha mining BS.
Good old school. Requires jet can or hauler. Also very old school there.
So as long as mining drones wouldn’t give any significant difference to that. I agree no biggy. And mining drone gameplay is present on the entire command line of miners. So a preview would be good in that sense.
Also how many drones do alphas get now?
You’re flipping the topic now. An alpha clone can get more with good old school battleship mining but that still isn’t enough. You already get better income as an alpha clone flying a combat ship but that piece of information isn’t enough. The drone mining is a support function rather than a main income for a command ship so they don’t feel completely useless in a mining fleet but that’s not enough.
So why don’t you fly in a fleet and earn the ability to use mining drones by subscribing to gain that income? If you’re not willing to work for it then even giving you a taste of something that is less than battleship mining is a joke of a statement.
I’m done here if you’re going to rely on repetition of “but it’s so little” again.
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MinerArt makes an excellent point. As much as I’d like to see mining cruisers become a decent option, the way mining drones are currently balanced doesn’t fit well with the alpha setup. Cruisers might have the right mining output but battleships would be buffed too much.
Five. A battleship can already mine significantly faster than a Venture, and virtually all of them can pump out five mining drones.
I think the real mistake was giving Alphas access to battleships.
Alphas wouldn’t mine in a battleship anyway. I’ve posted fits for a mining Rokh on here several times. They want something that can be AFK’d, and a mining battleship sure as hell can’t be AFK’d…
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I agree completely. If the Alphas arguing for “we want more” were really interested in getting further in the game, they’d be tossing as many Mining Lasers as they could onto a BS and going out to wreck belts.
But that approach requires you to stay at the keyboard, targeting new 'Roids and using said Lasers. And they want something that can passively make them lots of money while they go AFK and play PUBG or Fortnite or whatever.
They want something that makes it easier to afk for faster income. It’s a contradiction. Faster or tougher or more space. You do not get two.
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Nevertheless, it is very possible giving them mining drones could change that. And I won’t say I know. But consider the following:
- If a mining battleship has 50% higher mining rate and a quarter of the ore capacity, they’re removing ore six times as often for a small increase in output that already has difficulty justifying the expense of the ship.
- If a mining battleship has 100% higher mining rate and a quarter of the ore capacity, they’re removing ore eight times as often for a big increase in output that can more easily justify the expense and is certainly a good long term investment.
I don’t know how the numbers play out but in defending this idea, one would need to check that amount and consider how much it buffs alpha battleship mining, and check that it is a small enough amount that it does not over-encourage alpha mining.
The difference isn’t Battleship mining with / without Mining Drone support.
The difference will be actively mining in a Battleship, or AFK mining in a Venture or Vexor relying solely on the Drones.
But really, what all of this stems to… is that Alphas don’t want to join a Corp. If they had backup, especially Omega backup that can fly a true Hauler, then the cargo space on a Battleship wouldn’t matter in the slightest. Grab some ore, hand it to your Hauler friend, and let them carry it around. But that requires socializing, and being attentive.
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Most of the battleships can run with 8 miner II units. Only Gallente has a 7. So I’ll go with that just for the math.
Standard Miner II is 60 input per cycle. Gains 5% per level of mining (limit 4 for alphas) for 72 input. *7 because that’s what the Gallente turret setup would limit. That’s 504 input. This compared to my Venture’s input of 173 per Miner II for 346 input.
Mining venture’s 2 drones vs Megathron’s 5 drones is a no brainer.
So it’s not about the mining drones being able to be used by a mining ship because it’s by default lower without drones on the Venture.
Alphas cannot use any tech 2 things.