Does anyone have a good fit for a high sec drone mining Orca? I am a solo toon and want to mine and rat in the high sec belts while I mine. Can you help me out please?
Oh, and no I am not an AFK miner.
As it says, augmented drones - have trialed it, works well. Can fit a shield booster in hi, just havenât done. The AFK version (cough) might be to leave a shield booster running and swap out the active hardeners for amps. And also go back to T2 mining drones - the augs can die to NPCs.
[Orca, Active mining - augmented]
Reinforced Bulkheads II
Damage Control II
500MN Cold-Gas Enduring Microwarpdrive
EM Ward Field II
Kinetic Deflection Field II
Thermal Dissipation Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Small Tractor Beam II
Drone Link Augmentor II
Improved Cloaking Device II
Large Drone Mining Augmentor I
Large Drone Mining Augmentor II
Large Drone Mining Augmentor II
Hobgoblin II x5
Vespa EC-600 x5
Salvage Drone I x5
âAugmentedâ Mining Drone x5
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thank you
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Iâd drop the Drone Link Augmentor. Even if you only have Drone Avionics IV (and no Adv. Drone Avionics), you still have 40 km of drone control range, which should be more than enough. When mining youâll never be more than a few km from the rock and when rats appear, you donât need to fight them more than 40 km out. Hi-sec belt rats do no damage at those distance and will rapidly close.
So drop the DLA. Instead consider adding a salvager. Since you have a tractor beam already, you can salvage the wrecks you tractor in for a bit more isk/hr.
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- that Salvager will make mining less boring
Good points but I pack salvage drones, so no need for salvager.
I also pack combat drones, which is what augmentor is for. Which as you point out is also a tad overkill. However, with capability to field a full flight of Hammerhead II, the augmentor just enhances my capacity to go down with a beautiful and pointless gesture - all drones blazing.
Talking of pointless, augmentor is only really there 'cause I donât like empty high slots. Two of the other empties are now filled with shield burst commands which adds 31k ehp to give me a running total of 466,500. Under that scenario, what is the best option for high slot 6 - auto-targetting system or just a bugle, to sound Last Post?
But if you have salvage drones out, youâre not mining, which seems like a waste. Mining is very non-interactive, so you have time and attention to spare to manually salvage stuff with a salvager. And itâs only 3-4 rats at a time anyway.
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full defensive in mids : active shield hardeners ( 2em 1ther 1 kine)+invul
DC in low +bulkhead
2 T2 drone mining rigs and one T1.
highs have mining yeild boost + shield resist boost + shield buffer boost.
Then one remote shield booster if you are with a friend, and auto targeting module to have more asteroids targeted.
Remember you can OL the RR shield to heal 140 hp/s, with adequate fit on an mack this can be 700 ehp/s - so basically can negate a catalyst. Plus if you have more RR mods this can be very helpful (but you need to swap the bulkhedad for a coproc )
That makes a 350k ehp orca cold, with a large ancillary remote shield booster to help rep a friend if gankers land .
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I spent the day mining yesterday in a belt full of NPC miners, drones worked wonders at getting âmy shareâ - filled the Orca 3 times and took down over 4 dozen rats - complete with salvage. Worked mostly 3-4,000 meters from the rocks, moving constantly to the next set of rocks. Really appreciate the help. Retriever was constantly being out gunned by the NPCâs with empty cycle after empty cycle. With the NPC miners the Orca fit reduces frustration greatly.
Thank you again.
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change the mids to 2 adaptives, 2 drone nav computers, and the 500mn.
lows are 2 istabs, which you then mobile depot and swap to double DDAâs when youâve found a spot.
why are you bothering with DC and bulkheads⌠if yer in structure⌠yer gonna die anyways 
put something useful in those highslots like neuts so you can maybe escape if you get jumped.
donât believe that guy, heâs trying to make you fit for less tank.
nav computers are useless
nope. dc+bulkhead offer a huge bunch of ehp. Istab on the other hand are completely useless since you already fit a 500mn which makes it 10s align.
the time for you to lock your target, you are already dead. so those highs are actually completely worthless
your ONLY defense in HS orca is your EHP. The more you have, the more expensive (in isk, time, players) it becomes to kill you, the less interesting you are to gank.
The rats are not an issue unless there is a fob (in that case, change system)
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I have already trades some of the drone related fit for tank. I prefer EHP to M3/S
the only real impact on your yield is from the rigs. if you use a mining orca, then you most likely want the mining rigs as they make a nice increase - with 350k EHP almost nobody will even try to gank you for a mere ⌠well, nothing if you fit T2.
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Nobody will gank T2 Orca for profits. But some people can still gank you for âtearsâ, have this in mind and keep one eye on local chat. And bumpers⌠this guys can launch you 50 km away from rocks and ruin your day.
how does it even ruin your day ? if you have a mwd you can easily corret trajectory, and he loses more time that you did.
Also use the MTU, it will tractor all the wrecks nicely right in front of your salvager, and then no more need for tractor beam, and by approaching the MTU you can use it as an anchor so your Orca doesnât drift off , then put 5 drones on 5 rocks and start checking your market orders, Industry, research, PI etcetera.
As already said in high sec your only protection is your max EHP during 10 to 20 seconds. Neuts on an Orca will only serve in low or null sec when you want to try to defend you and your fleet. Solo in high they are useless against 120 ganking destroyers.
I have the 5 mids full with adaptives and active shield hardeners. One use I found for drone speed augmentor is to make the augmented mining drones to fast for the belt rats. Otherwise they can and do attack them every now and then. The T2 mining drones are usually too fast for them with the right drone skills. Bulkhead and damage control in the lows.
The MWD+inertia Stabs are useful with the cloak II for hauling through low sec. You can actually pull off the MWD-CLOAK trick in a properly fitted Orca. But they have no use during mining.
I survived one gank during BURN JITA which I wasnât aware of that it was going on, left me with 110 kill rightsâŚ
Guy bump you with 500 MN Stabber, for example, so you fly away from rocks 1.5 - 2 km/sec, This annoying players just bump you again and again, more you try to avoid it - more âfunâ they have.
But it probably rare occasion in some quiet system away from trade hubs.
Never happened during my several years of Orca mining. These bumpers, CODE- dudes and the like get way too much over- attention.