This blog has been somewhat controversial in some circles, to utilize classic understatement. This isn’t going to be a rant, because A, rants aren’t productive, B, there have been enough already, C, I see where it’s supposed to be going. Or at least I think I do.

Rorqual changes:

These have been coming for a long time. They need to happen. Yes, they’re painful for those who have invested in a rorqual mining fleet. How much have those people made off the rorqual fleet they have? If they haven’t at least made it back by now, they either timed it really badly, or they’re fibbing. They need to happen, because the rorqual fleets hovering up the ore in the universe (and building titan fleets) was the main thing which prompted the start of scarcity. It was never going to go back to the way it was. Should they mine a bit more? I could see that. Should they out mine a hulk? I would say nope. At best a Mack. (which is the high ore hold exhumer. not the high yield one.)

It might be worth thinking about reducing the volume of moon ore, to boost its mining rate, without boosting the rate for regular ores. That way you’re not messing with the production of moon goo as much.

Orca change (and Porpoise)

Pretty much inherent in the Rorq change. These are no longer solo mining ships. They’re Mining boosting ships, which can do a little mining on the side.

Oh, and the porpoise needs a bigger cargo hold, because of:

Compression

Good idea, needs some tweaking. Waste is there to cause choices. (Who remembers the days of compressing with 425mm rails?) Takes too long for some types, should be able to load from a specialist hold. Even if that load is drag and drop. Or better, should be able to be cycled, and use ore like fuel. so you don’t need to load it at all. (problem here is, nothing which uses fuel has outcomes depending on what the ‘fuel’ is. Maybe ammo which determines fuel types or something?) Just a thought.

Waste

To blatantly steal something from someone on the forums, rename this to Tailings. and make damn sure you don’t use the verb waste anywhere, because it feels terrible. you didn’t ‘mined X units and wasted Y units’, you ‘mined X units, with Y units of tailings.’ Even if you leave it as waste, ‘mined x units with y units of waste’ feels better than being told you ‘wasted units’. Yes, it’s just a slight rewording, but it’s an important one. People are emotional creatures. The meaning is the same, but the impact is different.

Also, change the order of operations, so you get your ore first, _then_ the waste is removed from the asteroid. That way, you don’t take away ore from people. They always get what’s left in the asteroid at the end.

Oh, and add a mining boost which reduces waste. Maybe add it to the effect with the crystal preservation? probably on percentage chance rather than multiplier, but both would be interesting. Percentage multiplication of the waste percentage. so a 50% bonus would be 50% for T1, and 17% for T2. (more effect for T1)

Gas huffing

Keep this on the smaller ships. Boost it on the barges.

Barges

Don’t see why the changes in tank and fitting were done to the skiff/procurer. Shield tank makes sense there, and hacking off a sixth of the shield hp and sticking it on armour doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. I do like the higher BW though 😉

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I don’t expect CCP to change anything major with what they’re doing. I’ve been at this too long to this. But there’s always space for tweaks, and those can be pretty major

And there is more coming. The dynamic distribution.

I may have more thoughts in future, but this is it for now. I have a nagging feeling I’ve forgotten things.