For me it’s to have fun. I pay for a subscription so I can fly all sorts of ships so I can enjoy the fights and puzzles that this game throws at me. Yes, I could buy PLEX for real money and make ISK faster than if I were to do exploration, but what’s the fun in that? For me it isn’t, but for other players it might be more fun to simply buy PLEX, exchange it for ISK and use that ISK to fly ridiculously expensive ships that they can then lose. If that’s their idea of fun, good for them, and good that CCP enables them to do so.
People play EVE for various reasons. Relax, get away from real life, to immerse themselves in a fictional universe, to make a name for themselves, to talk to people, to make the numbers go up…
I mined for the first time yesterday, for an “important” mission. I only needed 1000 Veldspar but I filled my hold because another player, in a huge mining ship ( solo ) conversed with me the whole time after telling me that if I needed compression he’d be more than happy to help.
I thanked him and told him that I really didn’t need it.
So I thought mining was boring ( it still is ) but chance encounters like those make it fun.
Those ships exist to be used in a fleet. Most of the content and activities are designed for fleet-play. I was surprised that was mining solo in such a big ship. I was waiting for gankers the whole time we conversed, lol.
I may give this mining business another chance. In LowSec and in a fleet of course. But purely for the social aspect. I don’t need to be isk-rich when I have plenty of euros.
You have to figure out whether you’re „playing Eve to have a job“ (i.e. caring about ISK/hr to plex your account) or „playing Eve for another goal“ which requires you to answer your own question and pick a path forward.
If you want numbers to go up and up and never go down then you’re preventing yourself from going through the fundamental gameplay loop of Eve:
Try
Fail ← You are stuck here
Learn
Try Again
Succeed
If you cannot handle the fact that you are fallible and can fail and make mistakes — just like everyone else — then there are other games that let your numbers go endlessly go up and never go down in perfect safety.
1st, Mining in general is the #1 target choice for easy kills as the “pvp” hard cores know you really can’t fight back in a mining vessel, so you pad their killboard easily, learn to be slippery.
2nd, watch local, watch local, watch local. Some one comes in, you dock up.
3rd, use a venture or a prospect, something that will get away easy till you know what to do.
4th, never never never never never mine within Dscan range, “15AU to be safe”, of a gate.
I solo mine all the time in low with a barge too you just need to actually have the skill to do it. You can’t afk mine like you do in highsec. In a barge you should be mining while aligned to a exit point so you can get out right away when people arrive. Smashing d-scan all the time and watching local is also necessary. Highsec is basically a tutorial. Basically don’t use your lack of skill in danger mining as an excuse, there’s loads of different ways the game gives you to keep your barge safe. Ps(if you want to learn how to mine in dangerous space send me a message in game)
So, as a low sec pirate, I’ve hunted quite a few ventures, and I’m going to tell you how I do it, and steps you can take to prevent getting blown up.
1), pay attention to local. Get a feel for the population. You probably want to make sure that you’re in an empty system. Stay away from systems that a jump or two into low (from high sec) and systems that have lots of asteroid belts.
ping your d-scanner every three seconds. Have it set up to show results for ships, AND combat probes. If you see probes, get out. Someone is trying to ping your location and will be on you soon. If you see ships on the d-scanner, pay attention if they are approaching you and get out.
Have safe spots set up. And bounce between them if you are being hunted down by probes.
if you are using a station, have quick docks and undocks set up.
Use Zkill to determine what kinds of ships people local use. For example, if you see my ugly mug pop in, a quick zkill would show that I use stealth bombers to hunt ventures. So d-scan would be completely useless seeing me approach for a surprise attack. Probably just best to pack up leave, or wait me out.
Knowledge and intel is what gives you an edge. And it’s best you use it because us scum sucking pirates are doing the same. So don’t give yourself a disadvantage.
This game is for investors, mathematicians, bankers, politicians and gamers who only seek to disturb other players’ gameplay out of spite.
I haven’t found one positive about this very expensive 20-year-old game. No wonder it’s dying.
I’m glad I didn’t. Biomassing in 9 hours. Going back to Destiny 2.
At least Destiny doesn’t have unfindable blueprints and secrets only mentioned in never-heard-of websites.
Completely missed the point. But that’s okay. A giant game of space rock paper scissors, where gathering intel on your fellow capsuleers is too difficult for you.
All said. You don’t feel responsible for what you do. This way you’ll never gonna win EVE.
A subscription is less than $30, do some research (btw that is the headline for all your EVE activities the first 12 months).
Then do some maths: How long am I to work rl for omega, and how long am I grinding in game. As long as grinding (mining, ratting) isn’t fun, rl work is going to pay much quicker.
As already mentioned by fellow players: It’s a game, the purpose is fun. If you don’t like it, don’t play.
But it looks like you enjoy ranting in forums. Good news: That’s for free!
Part of lowsec, wormhole space and nullsec is that you’re opting for higher risks in exchange for higher rewards. Now, you don’t have to be interested in PVP to do that, but part of the gameplay you’re opting for is learning how to survive and manage those risks while extracting greater rewards. Sometimes you will get killed. That’s the risk part. If you’re good, you will get killed far less often. That entails things like watching local, using safe spots, knowing the area where you are, and picking the right one - preferably somewhere out of the way and quiet if your goal is to avoid trouble rather than look for it. There are many people who will help you with these things.
To me - these days I’m more active in PVP, but when I started out in lowsec I wasn’t - the danger and the survival was part of the appeal. If that’s not gameplay you enjoy, that’s fine, but then lowsec probably isn’t for you.
Fit a medium Higgs anchor. That way, you can be aligned from the rock to a safe, at full speed (something like 35m/s) and instawarp to safe if anything comes in the system.
Looking at your killmail you were suing a 58M ISK ship to mine low value ores in low sec?
Why?
Fly a Venture.
Target high value ores - Dark Ochre etc.
Do not AFK
