Outer Ring Excavations mining agents in Highsec/Lowsec

[Kiddoomer]

o/,

I’d like to talk about some incentives for PVE miners, that doesn’t involve any new mechanic, ship or module, which is only this : the presence of some highsec or lowsec ORE agents for mining missions (and only mining missions). Here are the pro and cons that I can see for now :

• A lot more incentive for doing mining missions on a regular basis, for now only Thukker are worthwhile and even then it’s not that great. It gives player another choice of an industrial activity to do to vary gameplay.

• More people gathering LP for ORE => ORE modules become available at decent prices => more shinies on mining ship => more incentive to gank them => more destruction happening

• more modules availables for mining ship add more choices and fits availables for all kinds of space

• I don’t know if bots are a lot into missioning outside of FW and belt mining, but mining missions are about 10 and very easy to do, it’s more about the completion time than anything really, so it could lead to incentive for bots to do them

• it could give more yield to mining ships availables to Alpha clones, but being more shiny would make them even more attractive to gankers

Adding them to either highsec or even lowsec would make people way more willing than to go in the actual deep NPC space to get them.

EDIT : corrected the false BPO argument

[Do_Little]

The entire mission system needs an overhaul but we need to agree on a format. Some people want predictable content that can be farmed while watching Netflix (or by bots). Others want dynamic, procedurally generated content that’s different each time and requires players to maintain situational awareness.

Ore agents in empire space would be farmed for lp which simply reduces its value - I’m not sure that’s a good idea. CCP could accomplish the same objective by adding some useful stuff that isn’t available as loot drops to the existing empire LP stores.

[Kiddoomer]

I don’t mind the way mining missions are done, adding a few more with some spice to them like requiring mercoxit crystal or spawning a strong NPC during the mining would be fine, but really I don’t expect the missions to change anytime soon and don’t mind.

For the LP that would go down in value, that’s the point actually, Ore modules cost way too much for them to be a choice for miners, for example the ore strip miner (which is slightly above T1 but with more range, useful for unboosted) cost about the price of a frickin Skiff (around 230M a piece), simply stupid to pay that much, but getting these down to let’s say 30M a piece, to put them on a 300M mack or hulk, is already more sensible.

And as said if putting agents in highsec would be too much in accessibility, lowsec could be a better idea, giving with better moon ore and ice a new incentive to go there for non PVP focused players.

[Anderson_Geten]

this high cost of modules is not from the position of agents but from the high demand of ISK for those items.

ORE miner costs 30M base + 45K LP. Even in HS at 2k isk/LP the item would cost 120M, and that would be at a loss (other mining agents are more than 2k).

remove the base ISK costs of LP stores and you will already have better items costs(in that case, 90M).

[Dread_Saboteur]

No it should stay as it is but perhaps we can have a different influx of bpcs.
Take for example Mordus Legion tiny confined to 0.0 but with random moderately difficult spawns in lowsec droping bpcs.What of ORE mining groups or convoys were added and dropped said bpcs and implants

[Anderson_Geten]

out of topic.

We are talking about LP store of ORE. that LP store is said to have “too expensive price of items” in the market. I say this is not linked to the truesec of agents, but because the LP store requires base amount of isk/LP that makes this not worth at lower prices.

If you drop the bpcs like other factions do, you jut make the LP store even less relevant. If the bpcs drop in non-neglectible quantities , then the price of the items will drop, which means the interest of the lp store will be drastically reduced. So those agents will become completely useless.

[Kiddoomer]

So really a better idea to balance better the LP store of ORE would be to modify the LP costs of the items in it ?
I’m not against it even if it seems like an easier access to those items without much counterbalance to it.

Something to keep the LP store valuable can be to keep the mining ship BPO only in the nullsec LP store, so that people have still a very good reason to go after the nullsec agents, or even split the LP store with a subcorp of ORE that only gives mining modules. That way people still have to go do the missions in nullsec to get the ships BPO.

[Anderson_Geten]

@Kiddoomer

So really a better idea to balance better the LP store of ORE would be to modify the LP costs of the items in it ?
I’m not against it even if it seems like an easier access to those items without much counterbalance to it.

I don’t know what is “worth it” or not. I have no idea why those items should be cheaper.
I say putting agents in HS won’t change the price of the items.

I say, if you want to make those items cheaper, then you NEED to reduce the LP offer cost. Is the “items cheaper” a good think? No idea.

@Kiddoomer

to keep the mining ship BPO only in the nullsec LP store

no bpo in LP store. BPOs are available in NPC market, that’s a general setting of the game.

@Kiddoomer

That way people still have to go do the missions in nullsec to get the ships BPO.

no ? BPO are not a consumable item.
average sell volume is 2/day. https://evemarketer.com/types/17481/history . This is so low nobody would want to do missions in null only for this.

[Kiddoomer]

Oops my bad for the BPO, I was sure they were linked to the LP store, so my entire idea around them can be scratched.

As for the why I want the item cheaper, it is because I would like to see people use them more for their ships. I see and use a lot, and I mean a lot of faction/complex modules on PVE and PVP subcaps, ranging from same price or cheaper than T2 to above 300M in price.

But for the mining modules we only have very expensive modules, there’s no inbetween since there is only very few modules and all come from the same place. I want more choices in fitting an exhumer without having to pay more than what cost the hull for one better module than t2. And it’s more about modules that have better fitting requirement than yield, since tanking them is so difficult outside of the proc/skiff.

EDIT : maybe the reason above sounds too much entitled, I’d like basically that miner have more choices relying on them to choose between yield, tank and capacity to escape, instead of just choosing the hull and not having to think too much about the fit of the ship.

[Anderson_Geten]

It does not sound entitled. You have your opinion on the topic, I have none. I’m not saying you’re wrong - I’m saying I have no opinion about the “correct” price, so I only give my experience on WHY the price is so high, and in the case it is too high, what can and what can’t change it.

[Dread_Saboteur]

The isk/lp cost of items like the mining lasers has no equivalent to other factions the other mining corps don’t sell faction mining lasers so how much is enough or too little when you cash in at LP store?
What do you compare it to?Also t2 is hands down better than faction here

[Kiddoomer]

True that except the hybrid mining upgrades we got with operation permafrost, and a few meta modules, all of the relevant faction modules come from ORE.

For why people would choose these then cheaper faction modules instead of the more efficient T2, before anything I’d say these are targeted for people using Exhumers, mostly mack and Hulk but Skiff too, T1 barges are not worth the investment in expensive modules given their “easy to gank, easy to replace” use.

As for now, mack and hulk are not easy at all to tank for NPCs in null or wh space, even lowsec can be a problem given which faction of rats is present. having a good yield with T2 modules is fine and all, but having to babysit Hulk or warp away with a mack like if you were flying a venture doesn’t seem ok imo. I know Hulk are supposed to have a mining fleet use, but sometimes NPCs will wack them so hard they will have to warpout cause they won’t survive by the time their support is done with the npcs.

Given the above, accessibles faction modules, for someone typically mining most of its ingame time with 1-2 characters, can give access to better tanks with midslots, and with that, even putting a drone damage amp in the low wouldn’t seem a bad idea at all. It wouldn’t make a hulk a skiff of course, but a wider array of fit instead of just putting 3 T2 MLU in the low is always a better thing imo, more choices gives more stuff to think about for a miner, which isn’t something they’re in excess of.

That way, choosing the right ship for the job would be a start, and Then choosing the right fit for the ship will become a new layer of thinking, which will help to separate more experienced miners that someone that recently injected the exhumer skill.

TL DR : lower the price until a ore MLU or strip miner go down to about 20-30% max from T2 hull price. and make faction more accessible to let people not totally kill their ship by allowing worse MLU, but still keeping tank or dps module available on the ship.