25/08/10 15:39 PM
| Jaspet | 55.92 |
| Omber | 55.99 |
| Hemorphite | 62.18 |
| Pyroxeres | 68.21 |
| Hedbergite | 74.04 |
| Veldspar | 65.77 |
| Kernite | 88.68 |
| Plagioclase | 84.13 |
| Scordite | 68.17 |
| Spodumain | 75.94 |
| Dark Ochre | 95.49 |
| Gneiss | 95.24 |
| Crokite | 172.65 |
| Bistot | 216.26 |
| Arkonor | 270.56 |
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I managed to get my skills trained to the point where I can begin to use Research and Development agents. They are a particularly secretive and demanding bunch of people on the whole. Once you get in with one it seems to pretty straight forward, but the initial hurdle has been immense. Science, Research, Research Project Management, any one of 20+ specific skills are necessary to even engage their services. Then there is a trifecta of skill that need to be trained to make the most of your agent’s time and earn more research datacores. Connections, Negotiation and the specific research skill all go into determining how much the agent will accomplish.
So all that to say that at Connections III, Negotiations II and Hydromagnetic Physics III, I’m earning about half a datacore per day. Given the current market conditions, this translates into about 100,000 isk per day. I likely won’t bother selling the datacores for cash though, as I will want them for invention. The Hydromagnetic cores are good with both ships and modules. I am training to also use Caldari Starship Engineering as that will be necessary for ship invention as well. This requires me to max out Mechanic which I’m sure I’ll need for hull tanking later in life.
On a more technical note, I’ve continued to update my spreadsheets to reflect the on-going nature of my skills and pursuits in EvE. Toward that end, I’ve learned a lot also from Letrange and his own calculations. I know a lot of people he’s helped out, and I can only aspire to help half as many. One of the many insights gained from talking with him is the wonderful patience he exudes as he trains, manufactures, PvPs, researches, or anything else [including make mistakes - rare].
The worksheets now calculate isk/jetcat of ore, isk/m3 of ore, refine rates, inventory current values and I am putting the beginnings of the blueprint originals in [in large part thanks to Letrange again for the motivation if not the actual format]. As is true with any work of science, it begins to take on a life of its own, apart from any previous contributions. I have all new formulae and functions and it nearly makes me giddy. Soon it will be time to buy some new shoes and handbags!
I’m always trying to make the best of both what I have and what I can do. In some cases that means being as efficient as possible and cutting costs and corners. At other times it is a matter of training that last skill to level V. Currently I’m working at wrapping up Production Efficiency to level V so that the stuff I manufacture costs less and I’ve been slumming [mission running] so that I’ll have enough LP to purchase an Inherent Industries ‘HX-2′ mining implant and then the ‘HY-2′ ice duration implant. My clone out in the Ardalabier ice fields will get the HY and the main high-sec mining clone will get the HX. I’m about half way there. If I get those all squared away, I’ll consider a set of implants for the mission clone.
On other progress fronts, I’m getting closer to having some good R&D agents with Lai Dai. I have plenty of standings, but the skills are still by major road block. For someone who likes to do a little bit of everything, getting your skills up to a sufficient level can be maddening. So in four days I’ll shift from production training to research training all the while I’ll be missioning to be able to mine more efficiently.
On the sales front, I know I’ll need more order slots, but that has also fallen in terms of importance to the other options. I’ve been putting my LP from Amarr corporations into faction laser crystals. This has been fairly profitable as they would otherwise just be collecting dust and the crystals additionally required for purchase have all been from mission loot.
Summary:
Perfection is painfully slow in coming sometimes.
Implants are worth the cost [sometimes].
LP should be available to sell/contract/trade.
Clones allow for specialization without alts.
Addendum:
Apparently magnetic cable flux disruption from a small planetoid in some far distant system is playing havoc with my pod’s electronics and it’s taking hours to accomplish little tasks like docking, warping, jumping or even just using the coms. [Some numbnut cut two major under sea cables in the Mediterranean Ocean and all of my connections are being routed to Venus first which further results in a ping of something on the order of 4800 ms.] I think the term is Sad Panda™.
And so I get back from a couple of days of vacation and what do I find? I’ve been tagged by Godlesswanderer who I enjoy reading, but honestly lost track of for the last couple of months.
The Rules
- Link to the original tagger(s), and list these rules on your blog.
- Share 7 facts about myself in the post – some random, some weird.
- Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
- Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs and/or Twitter.
My 7 Facts:
- I was born in a village of about 400 persons.
- I am an education junkie with a BS in Biochemistry, MA in Religion and an MBA.
- I love scented candles but hate incense.
- I like mountain hiking, snorkeling and being able to do both in the same day.
- I am the project manager for a first aid/safety training center.
- I just got a new job as the director of an Arabic language training center.
- In the last 8 years I’ve moved 7 times.
And Tagging The Following:
- A Miner
- A Maker-Industrialist
- A Mother
- A Mission Pilot
- A Macro-Miner Enemy
- A Merlin Jockey
- A Mimic
And that’s that. Well, actually they are all me. While I wanted the opportunity to join in, I think we’re about out of people to link to. If anyone wants a link, let me know, but otherwise I’m calling it.
So hot off my recent successes with exploration, I fired up The Pogues and headed out to try and find some more hidden belts. This time I jumped two gates downstream to the last system in the constellation and figured I’d work my way back toward home. If I failed to find any results in those systems, I’d then move on up toward the other end of the constellation. Needless to say, the first three systems were busts. I didn’t get a single signature hit on any of them. (It is a good think I’m making these probes on my own now.)
On the fourth system I managed to pull up a single gravemetric signature on my Multispectral probe. I was excited, here was some yummy asteroid goodness to find and feast upon! I pulled up the system map and gauged where would be the ideal locations for my next set of probes. I wanted to get as much coverage as possible without wasting any probes. The problem is that this particular system is small and the five inner planets are all within a couple of AU of each other. I worked out a system I thought would work and started warping around laying my Quests out get a warp-able destination. The first set of probes didn’t return a signature which I had read on the datasheets wasn’t unheard of. I fired off another Multispec to make sure the hidden belt was still around and hadn’t been mined out by a competitor.
The trace still showed up, so I went and laid out another set of Quests to try and get a fix on it. I varied my pattern a little bit this time to see if a slightly different layout might get a result. On the third scan a weak signature popped upon my HUD and I was grateful to see it, even if a little bit tired by now. I was putting a lot of time and isk into this venture, as was excited to see it begin to pay off. I was still a long way from operating in the red on exploration as the first small site had more than paid for additional probes and skills, but I knew I couldn’t just rely on that. The signal strength was a paltry 0.019 and about an AU away. I warped to destination, destroyed my existing probes and popped some Pursuits into the launcher. I figured if I could get a solid hit here, I might could afford that sweet little SoE probe launcher I saw in the contracts catalog.
The net result of the evening of scanning was, I scanned with my mid-range probes for over 2 hours and never got any closer than .6 AU. Almost every scan came back negative, and those that didn’t were very unreliable. My one consolation is that the site must have been very good because I couldn’t locate it. [Note: Given my skill set, it could be that I just didn't have the ability to narrow it down.] This following hard on the heels of my earlier scan triumph, was disheartening and depressing. I still like scanning, but I’ve also seen his dark side and will be ever more scarred by it.
Having recently wrapped up Astrometrics IV, I headed out in my trusty Heron. I really like the ideas & mechanics behind exploration and I was excited to put it to work while I was working toward training the rest of the skills on the List™. My home system was empty so I warped next door to see what they had to offer. After my unskilled 431 second scan, what should appear to my multispectral probe but a Gravimetic site. Nearly lost in excitement I warped off to the first planet, simultaneously destroying the first probe and pulling up the system map to chart out the Quest probe layout.
The tiny system had two outer planets and a group of tightly bunched inner bodies. I figured out the best way to use four probes to completely cover all of them & then began another unskilled 431 second scan. On the very first run up pops a signature with a 0.6 AU accuracy. As I warped off to the point, I again bid goodbye to another set of probes & loaded some Gravimetic Combs to track it down. The first scan returned nothing, as did the second. On the third I could scarcely believe my eyes. A signature with an accuracy of 0m!
Flush with success, I cheekily warped to 0m and scanned the asteroid contents while aligning towards my home system. It was a small to medium belt of 15-20 rocks with about 175,000 units of various Omber derivatives. Arriving back home, I jumped into the Lou Ferrigno, loaded a fresh set of Omber I crystals and cleaned out the cargohold. The rest of the corp had long since docked and headed off to other pursuits. I knew this was going to have to be a one woman show. I opted to go with jetcans and risk the flippers as I was on a role as well as a bit of a time clock. Approximately an hour and fifteen minutes later I was busy loading the last of the ore and heading off to refine the whole mess.
Then I got a bit proud and maybe a tad cocky… (to be continued)
I’d like to introduce you to a new concept I’ve come to know very well. I like to call it late night math. I’m sure you all have a great familiarity with it. It’s the math that leads you to undock in a poorly fit ship because “it’ll do” and cause you to reprocess something because you just “know” you can sell the minerals for more. It’s the kind of math that leads you out into low-sec because you were ok there last time and cause you to see a market on an item at a great price, only to realize after you’ve bought it that the bottom has also dropped out of the demand as well.
Occasionally you’ll see minor variations of this. Some of the more popular ones include:
- Emoragequit – blindly screaming at the computer, turning it off and saying you’ll never be back
- Drunken Master – established player gives away stuff or blows it all up while drunk
- EFT – Empty Forum Threats – favorite home of the whine and whinge that really mean nothing
- Lovesick Loser – unrequited love blossoms in the deepest reaches of space
One or more of these may end up being combined into a sad state of pitiable pod pilot puke. Please ignore all of them and help stamp out Late Night Math.
How you might ask? Simple – don’t buy, sell or make major decisions after midnight, a couple of drinks or a fight. Simple. Really. No, honest.
As of late I’ve been flying around Tash-Murkon with a song stuck in my head. I blame Mynxee for no other reason than she comes to mind as a perfect fit for the song.
I guess I just lost my carebear
I don’t know where he went
Was gonna steal all his money
The corps gotta pay the rent
I gotta brand new Hurricane
And I’m gonna fly it tonight
I wanna find some trouble
I wanna start a fight
So, so what?
I’m still a pirate
I’ve got my drones out
And got a lock on
And guess what
We’re having more fun
And now your armor’s gone
I’m gonna kill your structure
You’re all right, you’re just dead
And you’re a fool
So, so what?
I’m still a pirate
I’ve got my drones out
And got a lock on
And so on. Doesn’t that just scream Hellcats?
[All to the tune of "So What" by Pink]
Just as a quick post, the price of Tritanium has skyrocketed over the last week. Prices in some areas have broke 5 isk/unit and many low-sec areas easily in the high 4′s. In high-sec hubs there are regular orders of 3.8 isk/unit. The price for a jetcan of Veldspar then has broken 3 million and is rapidly approaching 3.2 million as I write this. Currently it takes amost twice as much Omber to equal Veldspar. I’ve updated the sidebar to reflect the price changes. Interestingly enough, the other minerals have mostly fallen in the wake of tritanium’s climb.
In other mining news, my corpmates and I have noticed that there seems to be an overall decrease in the size of asteroids available. Due to heavy mining, many belts are being kept in a perpetual state of regeneration and only about 50% full. It means more work as we try to keep up with production demands and resource management.
On an unrelated note: shout out to Kyle Langdon and his Journeys In EVE who recently stumbled across Our EVE here. Update the Isk/Jetcan and you misspelled my name!
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