He shoots

... he scores! :)

Successfully managed to login my mining fleet and actually do mining. Not a single, touch wood, socket was closed error during the process.

Update to follow on what I've found out/done to get to this point.

So happy that I seem to have made progress though.

Ernest Shackleton would be proud

I've previously covered my use of the T2 Prospect mining frigate to run Level 4 gas mining missions in null sec. It's an excellent ship, fit as I have it its difficult to probe down and admirably does the job its designed to in the minimum amount of time.

In the December 2015 release, Frostline, a new T2 variant mining frigate called the Endurance was released.

Endurance

The Endurance is the latest variant of the Venture mining frigate from ORE. It has the same basic hull as the Venture and Prospect but a great blue-ish grey three tone colouring. Fitting wise the ship is designed to use the new Mining Lasers that were also released in Frostline and are designed to allow "ninja mining in WH or contested Null Sec space".

It's a great looking ship and I've taken a few images with a maximum resolution client so you can bask in the beauty.

A beauty of a ship I think you'll agree.

I've used every mining vessel in the game, including an Armageddon battleship when I was but a noobie, and they all have different uses but living in Null Sec I've found that the Hulk and Mackinaw are kings for mineral and ice mining in fleets but the slow align time and GTFO location that my ice belts are appearing in are making me look at the Endurance.

Fitting

My needs are reasonably basic:

• tank enough to survive the initial barrage of any belt rats 
• a fast align time; to allow me to escape at the first sign of trouble.
• one (or more if possible) mining lasers; to allow me to collect what minerals/ice I'm after
• low cost; so I can keep several on hand for when I do need a replacement and it won't hurt the wallet when I do

I'd like to say I came up with the following fit but I didn't, I appropriated it from ZGG friend Bex removing the probe launcher as I did not need that as I'll be in systems where I'll have dedicated scanner support.

[Endurance, Meth Addict]

Ice Harvester Upgrade II

Ice Harvester Upgrade II

Ice Harvester Upgrade II

Medium Shield Extender II

1MN Afterburner II

Survey Scanner II

Adaptive Invulnerability Field II

Ice Mining Laser II

Improved Cloaking Device II

[Empty High slot]

Small Processor Overclocking Unit I

Small Core Defense Field Extender I

All up the hull and fittings cost just over 30m ISK and combined with a dedicated mining fleet booster the cycle time per laser is between 30 seconds (with Expedition Frigates V) and 40 seconds.

PROFIT?

The ice will then be used to produce fuel for towers and sold, at discount, to friends and allies for their own use.

So far I've only had two at any one time running, this is the fault of my training queue and this is being rectified as you read this. By the end of the second week of 2016 I shall have four pilots mining ice for me.

This is a great ship, it's meeting a set of requirements I had and means that the slower and bulkier Mackinaw and Hulks I'd normally use aren't being put in unnecessary danger. Sure I'd like the frigates to have more than 1 turret hard point but what I have works and using Fleet mechanics I can squad warp in, mine until rats or a visitor appears then squad warp out leaving my tactical support to deal with rats or unwelcome visitors.

For 30m ISK I cannot recommend this ship and fit for ice mining in all regions of space be they high sec, low sec, null sec or even wormhole space (remember the probe launcher if you go there).

Ice Ice Mining

Evesterdam seems to have been a great success, especially in the consumption of alcoholic beverages it seems but there is game information coming out... in drips and drabs.

 

One thing that was in a presentation was this:

 

 

It appear the Prospect is getting a cousin with a role to specifically mine ice.  No pictures or statistics but in the Reddit thread on this CCP Terminus said the following:

 

So in addition to the ship we could very well be seeing new ice mining modules.

I'll be honest and say I wasn't expecting a new mining frigate let alone modules. This is a great news for "ninja" miners and those in wormholes/null sec.

Woo!

Prospective Prospects

I'm currently working with someone from the other local corporation (whom our Alliance are at actively waging war on (long story, still trying to decide whether to do a post on it)) to make four T2 Prospect ships, two for each of us. It'll be a good test of co-operation between ourselves and may, later result in further collaboration but for now I think we're both testing the waters.

Fortunately we're not shooting or smack talking each other, but that could change...

The end result will be the production of four Prospects, two for him, two for me.

The Ship

It's certainly a good looking ship, it's the Venture hull but with a more polished colour scheme:

Bring Sexy Back

The ship is a T2 variant of the Venture but with the ability to fit a Covert Ops Cloak and through the new, Exploration Ships skill, a reduction in signature radius (which will be helpful to avoid incoming rat fire). The only disappointment is the removal of the Venture's +2 warp core strength that meant it was much harder to catch.

The following screenshot shows the full Ship and role bonuses along with the difference between the Venture and Prospect in build requirements:

Build Requirements and Statistics for the Prospect

Currently the ship is selling for 21.5m in Jita (other locations may be more or less expensive) with production costs around the 13m/16m bracket (depending on component BPO ME levels), so there is profit to be had if you do the invention yourself as the price of BPC's on the market make the profit margins razor thin.

Test Drive

As I have yet to fly the ship I cannot comment on how it handles or functions, but once I do I will report back.

High Sec L4's vs Null Sec L4's

I've been doing Mining L4's in null sec for about two weeks now and it certainly has a higher reward per mission than high sec ones. Security missions in high sec got me about 6000 LP per mission at nearly an hour a mission, in Null sec I can cherry pick two missions for over 15,000 LP and finish both in less than 30 minutes combined.

Gevlon Goblin has recently posted about Mining missions and how they can be farmed so the cats out of the bag in respect to that. Fortunately I haven't seen an increase in my null sec location of miners but I thank my Alliance and Appetite 4 Destruction for keeping the area well policed of pesky reds and hostile neutrals.

Risk vs. Reward

Of course it's a lot more risky in null sec but that's where the reward is and in all honesty I feel safer when I'm in null sec missioning because I'm actively focused on the Local window and have d-scan running, even when I know the people in local I'm still watching and ready to bug out.

I'm not watching a movie or browsing websites when I'm missioning, I have to pay attention to what I'm doing and what is going on around me.

Cost vs. Profit

For Security missions in high sec I have a 1.7billion ISK Maurder and T2/faction fittings. I worry about using it with lots of people in local and am cautious with it when I do mission. 

For Mining missions in null sec I use a 500k + 2m in T2 fittings Venture. I don't worry about losing it as people tend to ignore a Venture as it's not worth that much and is quite hard to catch with the +2 warp core strength bonus.

Average mission in High sec brings in 6000 LP and two to four million ISK whereas a null sec one gives five to six million ISK and 8000 LP. Storyline missions are about the same in rewards (standard implants + big faction standing bonus).

Overall the risk I have to put up with is high sec based, sure I have local and d-scan to watch in null sec but the rules there are, don't know them safe up, whereas high sec is different and the first you know they're bad is when they are shooting you with 20 of their friends in gank catalysts.

Boredom

One thing I do like about the Mining missions are they are not boring like Security missions, yes they are as repetitive but they are much shorter and don't require you to keep pressing the F keys and locking up targets, in the right order.

This takes the boredom out of missioning, I've done entire days of Security missions and had to take a few days off because I was just over it but with Mining missions I haven't had that. In fact I've actually logged in from work to see what the next mission I'm offered is then decline or delay that depending on if I want to do it.

Conclusion

The null sec missioning is definitely more profitable, I actually cashed in LP for a couple of Low-Grade set of Snake implants and have moved them out of the area ready for selling. Actually one has been offered to another blog writer at a discount because I misread what implants he recently lost (DOH!) but the offer is stil there and I've already started work on getting the implants he does want.

Null Sec missioning is more enjoyable and much more rewarding and I will be getting another two characters up to speed with standings to maximize my income when I do mission. Having the potential to bring in nearly 30,000 LP per character per hour of missioning is certainly worth my investment in skill training and asset acquisition.

Comfort Zone

I've been playing EVE for nearly four years, that's four years of living in wormholes, null sec and high sec. I've yet to live in low sec but there is plenty of time to do that and the one thing that these things all have in common is I've been very comfortable in what I've done.

I've felt safe, secure and have always had the backup of people I trust. Very recently though I've started branching out into null sec without the safety net I've been used to and as a result I'm out of my comfort zone and I feel I've grown as a player.

Hermit Behaviour

For three months I've not left the system where I'm based except to jump to high sec or in the case of one character, move to a station in the next system over where I can jump clone to/from. I've led a sheltered life, very sheltered if I'm to be honest.

I've mined, reacted and manufactured without a care to the goings on around me and whilst I've done well I could do better and over the past week I finally decided to do something else.

Missioning, again

"You can earn 12,000 LP for one gas mining mission, no more than 15 minutes with good skills"

That was the quote I've heard four or five times from various corporation/alliance people and I've listened but did nothing about it. It doesn't help that most of my characters have high negative standings with the two corporations I'd need to get the missions from.

But salvation come in the unlikely form of my boosting alt, he had absolutely zero standings with any faction and only a couple of corporations liked him, a bit. An alliance mate offered to give me a hand with basic standings so I could run them myself and he did seven missions over the two corporations and I magically had 1.0 standings with both in less than an hour.

Fortunately you can get standings just by being in a fleet when a mission is completed and I took the chance to drop off some materials in Jita for sale (before Burn Jita started) and buy myself some modules for use on a Venture that I'd use for the missions.

Skills Need Work

I also purchased the Mining Connections skill book and made sure this was injected and trained to IV. I also remembered that the Criminal Connections skill would be helpful for standings increases with the NPC entities I would get the missions from and may help me get to the magic 5.0 standings sooner.

I now have Criminal Connections IV and Mining Connections IV trained and am working on Level V for both after I finish Mining Frigate V.

Results, are promising needs more work

It's been four days since I started mining missions and I've got just over 20,000 LPand 3.80 standings (4.43 modified). Nearly enough for Level 4 missions and they're the ones that will bring in the big LP amounts.

I'm getting between 300 and 1000 LP per mission at the moment and this has been great. I'm used to getting no more than 300 LP for a distribution or mining mission in high sec but here in null the rewards are much greater. The dangers are too but these can be mitigated by good decisions and using d-scan regularly.

The LP store has Snake implants so my plan is to get a low-grade set of Snakes for the market and then if they sell move up to the high-grade set. It's a plan and the Storyline missions at least give me the implants I need for LP exchanges.

Confession Time

I've been playing EVE for just over three years now and believe, with the exception of Faction Warfare, I've sampled all the different professions available. And out of all of them I've found that, going against most other people that...

 

I enjoy to both Ice and Ore mining in New Eden.

 

 

 

There, I've said it. I must be one of the few who doesn't complain about pressing buttons or having to shift targets to mine Ore/Ice. But I do find the whole process rewarding and relaxing, sure a little more variation in what I had to do to mine wouldn't be a bad thing but the way things are now are just fine for me.

 

I mine for myself or when others ask me for specific minerals or ice components. I haven't done it for a while, I've been buying far too much of what I need on buy orders or from market hubs. But I do still enjoy a little mining when I can.

 

Being able to mine with an Orca or Rorqual boosting really helps and makes the time fly, that and a good TV show or movie running on another monitor.

 

PvP can be fun but I get just as much enjoyment, if not more, from mining...