Hello, Ice mining feels kind of bland. Should classic NPCs show up more often depending on how many miners are on grid? Or maybe in bigger waves. 3 NPCs per miner?
What difference would it make? You can thump an NPC belt ratâs nutsack and kill it. Everyone has their drones out, so the NPC waves would die in seconds, no matter how many you sent.
Itâs not âtunedâ at all. The belt just has some roaming NPCs that may threaten a single solo miner but are easily dealt with by a group of miners.
Thatâs why itâs a good idea as miner to group up, as you can easily deal with threats and have more time to use mining drones instead of combat drones.
If youâre looking for bigger threats while mining I suggest you try solo mining! 
It would be be fun with more NPCs if the belt was full of miners
Could also try out mining the belts in a system that has a FOB. 
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Or mining during a Sansha Incursion.
Speaking of which, letâs bring back the high sec Trig emerging conduits and roaming Trig fleets that terrorized the belts. Now THAT was fun.
Well, I actually like the idea because it adds dynamic and not easily predictable content if it is done right (see Abyssal PvE).
Some things have to be considered however:
- the spawns have to be adjusted by sec-status of the system, HighSec where new players or beginner corps mine should not get death-traps even if there are 5 Orcas in the belt. HighSec spawns just showcase the mechanic so the miners can learn the basics of what to do if they get ambushed during a mining session.
- the spawns should differ by type of the site, the more lurative, the more challenging the spawns can be. Risk â Reward. HighEnd sites can potentially attract HighPower NPC spawns.
- the waves have to be limited in size and amount to prevent people staying there endlessly just for farming the spawns (and getting loot/bounty from them). So after 1-3 unsuccessful attacks, the NPCs stop.
- The spawns should use the NPC types of the local pirates and their EWAR features (lore), always have tacklers in them outside of HighSec (risk) and randomly feature Triglavians/Sleepers if a wormhole is open in the system (immersion).
- the highest difficulty spawns should be designed to force the miners to use the full potential of their tools: ShieldLinks/ShieldTransfers on the Orca, Skiffs/Procurers as Miners/DPS ships, spare Combatships/Logis in the ShipBay of the Orca. Probably only happening in 0.1/0.2 Lowsec, deep 0.0, Pochven and WH space in the most lucrative sites.
If it is implemented correctly, it could add some more spice to mining ops, reward groups that learn how to deflect those ambushes efficiently and might be a pain in the ass for massmultiboxers (which is great).
Like from me for the general idea!
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It would still be farmed. For example, letâs say you are in a system with 20 belts. You start out at belt 1, wait for the NPCâs to spawn, kill all three waves, then on to belt 2. Rinse, repeat up to belt 20, then back around to belt 1, rinse repeat.
Could also be easily exploited. All I would have to do is warp to a belt were I know a fleet was mining, warp in with a fleet of 50 combat ships, which would in turn spawn a massive NPC wave, then warp away laughing as the mining fleet gets nukedâŚ
It seems there is a lot of ways to play around with the triggers. For example when an asteroid is depleted a wave of rats spawn depending on how much the ore was worth in the asteroid.
Come on, I explicitly said âif implemented correctlyâ. That explicitly means ânot implemented dumbâ. Of course this wouldnât be possible, nobody said the mechanic should work for each belt individually. And of course the loot/bounty of these NPCs should be very low compared to the ore value in the belt, so it would be never efficiently.
Not really, since the âambushâ would not be scripted. It is only a chance. You donât know if it spawns. Or when it spawns. It will probably take 30 minutes to spawn, or 45, or 60. - if it spawns at all, maybe it doesnât. Do you want to stay with 50 combat ships 30 minutes in the belt? Then you could simply take out the mining fleet yourself.
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So, if it spawns erratically, not at all, maybe maybe not, or not even in every belt, then whatâs the use? Thatâs the same system we already haveâŚ
Like I said, bring back the roaming Trig fleets. They did that right. It kept you on your toes, and they were still killable in a Skiff.
That it is much harder than the current âno threatâ NPC spawns and actually offer action, risk and reward for fleets that are prepared.
Well itâs somewhat comparable, just not âroaming fleetsâ of a single entity type, but a bit more sophisticated, oriented on the local NPCs, but also featuring some random enemies (trigs, sleepers) if WHs are present. And the chance increases the longer and the more miners are on grid. Still of course not âintentionallyâ and âpredictableâ spawning possible.
There are rare Core-OreBelts in WHs wher actually Sleeper Battleships can spawn. I can tell you they bring a miningfleet on itâs toes if they get tackle on the Orca. Itâs really fun and Iâd like the idea to have such spawns available everywhere under the right conditions.
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How often does that happen?
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Thats a fair point. :), but one can dream, right?
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We need space weatherâŚ
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We have space weather. Thereâs even a weather reporting website for EVE:
We need more random/violent space weather then.
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