Go in game, the mining fleets are only present to mine. They don’t drop anything, spawn huge response fleet - they don’t add anything to the gameplay other than emptying the roid belts.
CCP also added moon belts that give better ore, at a small price, and are not the target of the mining fleets.
If you want people to switch form an activity to another, you make the second better and the first worse. Exactly what CCP is doing. Just need to get rid of ice belts now …
Adding to the topic of npc’s on belts
The added white diamond npc’s are there for pilots who wish to play as a asteroid belt pirate will attack them, run from them. return and loot the ore cargo.
Think of the fun and frill of doing that on a brand new character, learn cat and mouse tactics vs their white diamond response fleets. Don’t mine when you can just blow up one of those npc ships and take their cargo.
Also there are industrial npc ships that drop loot boxes.
/Edit
Since when had this changed? I Looted a few just last Month.
So that is a feeling. You might well be right of course.
But this is perhaps why they did it:
Highly possible it was this rather than depletion, thanks for reminding me of that.
Indeed, just a feeling.
If it was for adding a new gameplay, they could have easily nerfed the mining yield of the mining fleet once it was clear people complained about it.
what I know :
Actually the Haulers drop various items while the mining ships just drop Ore.
I think the main intention of NPC Mining Fleets and their Attack Response Fleet was to encourage group play.
The mining fleets and the haulers are two separate things.
CCP could remove half the miners and still have the haulers.
-Deploy a Small Control Tower, add correct few and papers, put online.
-Use a Orca to scan the system to find the npc’s then board a hard hitting battlecruiser fitted with fast warp for the getaway.
-The forcefield will protect the orca from pilots trying to board and steal while you are away blowing up the scanned npc
-Return to board into the Orca, warp orca to npc mining wreck, loot and return.
1 pilot can easily down a venture before the response fleet shows up and the reason why a very fast long distance attack is needed as those.
Well there other ways.
o7
The Hauler is part of the Mining Fleet, without it the mining ships wouldn’t be able to continue mining once their cargoholds get filled up.
They still are two separate things.
they are part of the same thing. There is always an NPC industrial/hauling ship(s) among NPC miners that fly form one mining ship to another.
Also NPC mining stuff is hugely offtopic.
I was talking about “reducing the yield of the mining fleet” and “presence of haulers to kill by players” when talking about what is and is not the same thing.
Also no they are definitely not the same thing.
There is a model and an entityy id for the hauler, and different models and entity ids for the miners.
It’s very clear that some players are annoyed by those NPC . Maybe CCP considers their impact is not much (that is, I am wrong and this is not impacting enough players to be an issue for the playerbase). But all in all CCP could easily reduce the number or the yield, of the miners, or their fleets.
I don’t think it is, CCP are obviously toughening up the environment with the Trigs, and the mining fleets was an earlier gentler example with added game play elements.
It’s not a feeling. I actually sat there I watched Trigs warp in and kill a newbie Venture so fast it looked like an alpha-shot.
Erm, there’s ‘baptism by fire’ & then there is ‘overkill’. The world has changed since 2006.
Yeah, now they give you nearly free Ventures.
Honestly, if people quit because their ship that cost buttons to replace gets killed because they werent paying attention, why is this an issue?
Because it was in a 0.8, with practically zero chance to get off grid. And that initial grind to get some stuff in really isn’t easy.
Plus, Beer & Mining dude! It’s a fine EVE pass-time.
What impact does secuity rating have?
Zero chance if you are afk maybe.
And how much does a Venture cost these days anyway when its not free? About one level 1 missions worth of time?
Drinking while you fly is a sure way to earn a Rebuy
the fit I gave costs less than 500k . however that’smore than most L1 missions will give.
The funny part is : it costs less than a beer.
If its all about the relaxing, a venture hull and two civ miners would do the trick then wouldnt it?
And was it fitted with cargo expander in its low. And no tank?
People just have to change how they fit them now
According to what Hilmar et al said during an interview on Talking in Stations, one of their goals is to make it easier for new players.
Ventures are mostly used by new players (for mining anyway), so coding trigs to fry these noob frigates in hisec belts seems to be counterproductive to their goal of a less harrowing new player experience.
IMO, if a new player- without the situational awareness that capsuleers who stick around eventually/hopefully develop- is made to feel that even the NPCs are overpowered, they may quit before learning how interesting EVE can truly be. Ship replacement cost isn’t the only factor.