1. Mining 101 – The Basics

    1.1 Asteroid Belts & Ores – What they are, and what to expect to find

    1.2 Minerals – What is hiding in those chunks of rocks in your cargo

1.2.1 What Should I Mine Then? – The hottest topic in the universe

    1.3 The Beginning of a Miner’s Career – You might be new, but you shouldn’t be clueless

1.3.1 Your First Ship – You know that ship you start with, consider it trash

1.3.2 The Two Basic Mining Techniques – At least the only two that work

1.3.3 Industrial Ships – Huge, slow and full of goodness

1.3.4 Joining a Corporation – The universe is a large place, don’t go in the dark alone

1.3.5 Selling your Ore – The do’s and don’ts of the trade

1.3.6 Your First Cruiser – No, I am not referring to the motorcycle in the garage

    1.4 The Different Mining Lasers – Tools of the trade

2. Refining – Brining the trade into an art form

    2.1 Calculating your Yield – Yes children, I am speaking of math

    2.2 Refining Implants – For those with ISK to spare

    2.3 From Refining Yield to Reality – Knowing what to expect to bring home at the end of the day

3. The Math System – Yes it looks complicated, but look harder, it isn’t so bad

    3.1 The Skill System – That light bulb should be getting brighter

    3.2 Cycles – To be long or to be short, that is the question

3.2.1 Cycles and Yield Interaction – Can’t have one with out the other

3.2.2 From Yield to Ore – Cha’Ching!

4. Mining Barge or Battleship? – Or, serious versus casual play

    4.1 The Battleship Way – The slow, steady and convenient way

4.1.1 The Apocalypse – The Golden Banana

4.1.2 The Rokh – The Intergalactic Swiss Army Knife

    4.2 The Barge Way – Time to go deplete an asteroid belt

4.2.1 The Retriever – Cheap, easy to get into and effective

4.2.2 The Covetor – The Cadillac of Barges

5. Crystals – Ooh Shiny!

    5.1 How do I Read my Yield? – No, you aren’t the only one who gets it confused

6. Achieving perfection – Eureka!

    6 1 The Mindlink Isn’t Broken! – Yay, it finally works

7. The Mighty Hulk – Behold the beast!

    7.1 The Mighty Hulk's Tank – Yes, it can live in 0.0, if you are smart

4. Mining Barge or Battleship? – Or, serious versus casual play

This is one of the most popular questions. Should you head for a battleship or a mining barge? What is the difference ? Which one is better? All of those questions will be answered in this section.

The first thing you need to ask yourself is the following: do you want to PvP sometimes as well, or are you aiming at a professional mining career and want to concentrate your character only on improving your equipment and yield until you achieve perfection (yes, there is such a thing!)? 

If you are unsure for now, then aiming at a battleship isn't a bad idea. A battleship will mine as well as the medium mining barge (Retriever) if not outmine it depending of the battleship you  fly (more  on  that  later), and  the training for both at this point is more or less equal. If you know that you will want to be very serious about it, then heading directly for the Retriever is a better idea. Now is the time to use the math explained in section 3. Let's see if you really got it!

4.1 The Battleship Way – The slow, steady and convenient way

The two most popular battleships for mining are, since Revelation, the Apocalypse (Amarr, tier 2) and the Rokh (Caldari, tier 3). Although the golden banana has held first place in best mining battleship for a long time, the Rokh is now the master in this class. Both have 8 turret slots; however the Rokh has much more CPU, allowing him to fit one more Mining Laser Upgrade than the Apocalypse, and still enough to fit a tank as well. 

No battleships in existence have a bonus to your mining yield, so it really comes down to the turret slots and the CPU at this point. Since the Rokh and the Apoc really are preferred, this section will concentrate on those two ships.

I will assume you have the skills I suggested you train in the first section already trained, which would be Mining 4, Astrogeology 4. If you have no intention in getting a barge, then you will need Mining Upgrades 4 to fit as many Mining Laser Upgrades (MLU) as possible on your battleship (it will however not help you on a barge).  I will also assume you have Electronics 5 already. Mining setups are very heavy on CPU, so if you don't already, get it ASAP. 

Take note that the mining laser upgrades is the only factor allowing a battleship to compete with the Retriever. Without them, the Retriever will actually be superior in all cases.

4.1.1 The Apocalypse – The Golden Banana

This nice golden banana (sorry) can fit 8x T2 Miners and 3x MLU (you will need 4x Co-Processors II for this to fit though, and you are left with 18 CPU, so no space for a tank at all).

So let s see what kind of yield we will get: 60 * 1.2 * 1.2 * 1.05^3¹ = 100.0188 m3 / cycle Using Omber, it means 100.0188 / 0.6 = 166.698 = 166 units of Omber / cycle (per laser)

Since you are fitted with 8 mining lasers, you will be getting 1,328 units of Omber per cycle, or 79,680 units of Omber per hour. In short, the Apocalypse gives a 20.95% improvement over the Dominix. Nice bit of a change don't you think? 

4.1.2 The Rokh – The Intergalactic Swiss Army Knife

The Rokh got released with Revelations, and it is without doubt a nice battleship. It is even nicer when you know it out mines the Apocalypse since it can fit an extra MLU, for a total of four, while having still a bit of CPU to fit a medium shield booster, or perhaps shield extender. If you wish to keep only 3x MLU, then you have more than enough CPU to fit a very good tank. Do not forget the drone bay (you can have 5x T2 medium drones in there) for extra protection. For the purpose of this guide, we will use a full mining Rokh setup, but you should know the Rokh is superior to the Apocalypse in every way as a mining platform. 

So let’s see what kind of yield we will get: 60 * 1.2 * 1.2 * 1.05^4 = 105.01974 m3 / cycle. Using Omber, it means 105.01974 / 0.6 = 175.0329 = 175 units of Omber / cycle (per laser)

Since you re fitted with 8 mining lasers, you will be getting 11,400 units of Omber per cycle, or 84,000 units of Omber per hour. So you are looking at around 4,320 units more Omber per hour with the Rokh over the Apocalypse.

4.2 The Barge Way – Time to go deplete an asteroid belt

Before we go any further, you must know that the Procurer sucks, bottom line. The Osprey will out mine it, so the first barge you will go for will be the Retriever.

4.2.1 The Retriever – Cheap, easy to get into and effective

A big advantage of the retriever is that it uses strip miners, which means a longer cycle (less dragging) and is much cheaper than a battleship.

Skills you will need: Mining Barge 3, Industry 5, Astrogeology 5

I will assume here you trained Mining Barge to level 4 (3% bonus to yield per level) even though you only need level 3 to fly the retriever, as every little bits help I will also assume you trained Astrogeology to level 5, since it will be required for the Covetor! While we are at it, since you are serious about mining, you will also have invested the time in training Mining to level 5 as well if you didn’t start with it.. 

Let s see what kind of yield a retriever can fetch with 1x MLU (on a side note, no mining barge, not even a Covetor, can fit more than 1x MLU, no matter what skills you train). As I mentioned, Mining Upgrades 1 will suffice for barges): 540 * 1.25 * 1.25 * 1.12 * 1.05 = 992.25 m3 / cycle Using Omber, this means 992.25 / 0.6 = 1653.75 + 1653 units of Omber / cycle (per strip)

Since you re fitted with 2 strip miners, you will be getting 3306 units of Omber per cycle, or 66,120 units of Omber per hour. This is 20.51% less than the Apocalypse and 0.36% more than the Dominix. 

As you can see, the Retriever and the Dominix are pretty much on the same level, while the Apocalypse has a small but noticeable advantage over the mid-size barge. This is nothing to be too alarmed with, as in a month or so you will be flying a Covetor and thanking yourself you trained yourself to fly barges!  For the casual miner though, without any real interest in the profession, an Apocalypse with the proper use of MLU and Co-Processors will offer a nice mining platform without too much training.

4.2.2 The Covetor – The Cadillac of Barges

The Covetor is a very, very nice mining ship. Also much cheaper than a battleship (on average around 4 to 5 times cheaper, 18 - 20 million versus 85 - 100 million) and fetches an awesome yield. Although the training might seem extensive, it will absolutely be worth it at the end.

Skills you will need: Mining Barge 5, Astrogeology 5 (if not already trained)

Notably because of its 3rd strip miner, the Covetor is nice, nice – very nice. 

So let’s see what kind of yield we will get 540 * 1.25 * 1.25 * 1.05 * 1.15 = 1018.83 m3 / cycle. Using Omber, it means 1018.83 / 0.6 = 1698.05 = 1698 units of Omber/cycle (per strip)

Since you re fitted with 3 strip miners, you will be getting 5,094 units of Omber per cycle, or 101,880 units of Omber per hour. This is a 54.08% increase over the Retriever already, and a 27.86% increase over the Apocalypse.

Here is a chart that will sum it all up for you:

Ship …………… # of MLU … Omber per hour ……… Increase in yield

Retriever ………… 1 ………… 66,120 ………………… 0% (reference)

Dominix …………. 5 ………… 65,880 ………………… -0.36%

Apocalypse ……… 3 ………… 79,680 ………………… 20.51%

Rokh …………….. 4 ………… 83,664 ………………… 25.51%

Covetor ………….. 1 ………… 101,880 ……………….. 54.08%

The table shows the number of MLU required since those figures won't be true anymore when you move to 0.0 and need to tank. Mining in 0.0 space will be covered in its own section, however, you must know that these figures assume that you have someone tanking for you or that you do not need to tank at all.

5. Crystals – Ooh Shiny!

There are many misconceptions about mining crystals, as to how they work and if they truly are worth it. To make the matter worse, when you do a show info on your laser, the information is not so clearly displayed, and the EVE-O database has false information. I will set the record straight right now! 

There are T1 and T2 mining crystals for every ore in the game. However the crystals for mining Mercoxit work differently than the rest, and they will be covered in section 10 of this guide where Mercoxit mining will covered in details. You should know that there are no crystals for ice mining, so don't try to look for them.

Skills you will need for basic empire ore (Veldspar, Scordite, Pyroxeres, Plagiocase): Refining 4, Industry I, Ore processing 3/4, Science 3

Skills you will need for low-sec ore (Kernite, Omber,  Jaspet, Hemorphite): Refining 5, Industry I ,Ore processing 3/4, Science 3

Skills you will need for high-end low-sec ore (Dark Ochre, Spodumain, Hedbergite, ): Refining 5, Refinery Efficiency 4, Metallurgy 3, Industry I ,Ore processing 3/4, Science 3

Skills you will need for high-end 0.0 ore (Bistot, Arkonor, Crokite, Gneiss, Mercoxit ): Refining 5, Refinery Efficiency 5, Metallurgy 4, Ore processing 3/, , Industry I, Science 3

Before Revelations, all crystals had the same pre-requisites, that is, the ones high-end 0.0 ore crystals need. This discouraged many casual miners, as the training for those is as long as for the Covetor. CCP responded by changing those pre-requisite skills depending of the class of ore you mine, so whether you want to train for them or not is your decision. 

How they work is quite simple: they are inserted in the Tech 2 variants of strip miners, or the Modulate Deep Core Miner 2 which can be fitted on any ship. Simply put, the Tech 1 version of a crystal will increase the base yield of the laser by 62.5%, while the Tech 2 version of the crystal will increase the base yield by 75%. However, the actual increase to your yield isn't truly 62.5% or 75%, as the Tech 2 variants of mining lasers have a lower base yield than their Tech 1 counterparts. Nevertheless, crystals do bring an advantage, as we will see now.

As we have seen earlier, mining lasers or strip miners which use crystals have a lower base yield than their counterparts. They will work without crystals, the yield will however be considerably lower than their Tech 1 counterpart with out the crystals, so don't be stupid and use the Tech 1 versions until you can use crystals.

To use T1 crystals, you will need the skills mentioned above, and the [Metal] Ore Processing to level 3, for example Omber Processing 3. To use the Tech 2 crystal, you would need Omber Processing 4.

Here s a table that shows the different base yield of the lasers depending of the crystals you will fit in it:

Laser ………… Base yield (in m3) … with Tech 1 Crystal … with Tech 2 Crystal

Tech 2 Strips … 360 ………………… 585 ………………… 630

MDCM2 …….. 120 ………………… 195 ………………… 210

5.1 How do I Read my Yield? – No, you aren’t the only one who gets it confused

First you should know the EVE-O database is incorrect, so don’t expect to understand how Tech 2 strip miner works from there. Furthermore, when doing a show info on your Tech 2 strip, there is a lot of information in there and people are very confused. 

To know your current actual yield (including all skills and bonuses you are getting), look under Specialty Crystal Mining Amount (shown in the screenshot by a green rectangle). Just ignore Mining Amount, it will confuse you and there is no need to make it more complicated. 

This puts an end to our crystals section. As you can see the increase is absolutely worth it, and it is a good step to take before going on to the Hulk (if you ever do). Plus crystals can also be used with Modulated Deep Core Miner 2, which fit nicely on a battleship, so if you are an Apocalypse or Rokh miner, you can benefit from this. 

In any case, I suggest you train for crystals right after you got your Covetor.

To see your actual yield look at ‘Specialty Crystal Mining Amount’ (shown here straight from market window, when equipped it should be a different amount than ‘Mining Amount’).

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