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

6. Achieving perfection – Eureka!

There are many skills and modules that will increase your yield in this game. It is possible for a miner to max those skills and achieve what I like to call, the Perfect Miner. The perfect miner is someone who has no other possibility to increase their yield.

Here s a table with all skills and modules that can influence your yield.

Skill / Item ……………………… Effect ……………………………… Notes

Mining V ………………………… +25% to yield ……………………………

Astrogeology V ………………….. +25% to yield ……………………………

Mining Barge V ………………….. +15% yield of barges and exhumers ……

Exhumer V ………………………. +15% yield of exhumers …………………

Mining Foreman V ………………. +10% to yield ………………………….. You must be squad commander

Drone Interfacing V ……………... +100% to yield of mining drones ………..

Mining Drone Operation V ……… +25% to yield of mining drones …………

Crystals – Tech 1 and Tech 2 ……. +8.33% (Tech 1) or +16.17% (Tech 2) … Fit in Tech 2 lasers only

Mining Laser Upgrades ………….. +5% to yield per Tech 1 MLU, +9% per Tech 2 MLU

‘Highwall’ HX-2 (slot 10) ……….. +5% to yield (Cybernetics V) ………….. 75 – 100 Million ISK

Michi Excavation Augmenter …… +5% to yield per mining laser (Cybernetics V) .. 650 – 750 Million ISK

Ming Foreman Mindlink (slot 10) . +50% to Foreman skill, +50% to Foreman …

……………………………………. Link effectiveness (Cybernetics V) ……. You must be squad commander

I deliberately did not list mining foreman links or gang modules, as they cannot be fitted on a barge, or a battleship. Those gang modules will be covered in another section, since there are many changes to gang bonuses since Revelations.

Mining Foreman V however is valid, since you can just form a squadron with an alt and you both will receive the bonus, even if you are in a Hulk or a barge. 

The mining implants do stack, however as you may have guessed, you cannot plug both the Highwall mining implant and the Foreman mindlink in at the same time. 

The Michi implant is a COSMOS mission item, which explains why it is a little hard to find and is a whole lot more expansive. The Highwall implant is easier to come by and is quite a bit more affordable. Whether it's worth it for you to buy these or not, that is for you to decide.

6.1 The Mindlink is not broken  - Yay, it finally works

Since Revelations, the mindlink has been fixed, which it is always nice to have things that work. It is especially nice used along Mining Foreman Links (see section 11), and for squadrons. 

It s also a very cool implants, because:

a)      It enhances the Mining Foreman skill effectiveness by 50% (so at level 5, your bonus would end up being 10% * 1.5 = 15%)

b)      It boost the effect of all Mining Foreman Links (the gang mods) by 50%. 

Note: the 'Mining Amount Bonus' seen in the attribute window comes from the enhanced Mining Foreman skill effect which is 15% instead of 10%. It is NOT a 15% solo bonus.

The drawback is that you must be in a squadron and be the squadron commander for this bonus to affect you. The first bonus will be given to anyone in the gang, regardless of what ship you are in, while the second one is only useful if you are in a Battle Cruiser / Command Ship with an active Mining Foreman Link gang mod. In terms of bonus, having the Highwall Implant or the Mindlink ends up giving you the same result. The Highwall gives you a direct 5%, while the mindlink boosts Mining Foreman V by 5% instead.

It is however possible to win another 5% like this:

-          5% per laser from the Michi Implant

-          5% from the Highwall Implant

-          The extra 5% from the Mining Foreman skill boosted by a squadron commander that had the mindlink instead of you.

In a perfect world you would have a maxed out miner, and a friend (or alt) which has the mindlink plugged in acting as a squadron commander. This is how you would be what I call The Perfect Miner.

For the sake of example, let us have a look at what a Covetor will yield with all those skills maxed and those nifty implants (drones aside):

360 * 1.25 * 1.25 * 1.15 * 1.15 * 1.05 * 1.05 * 1.05 * 1.75 = 1507.03 m3/cycle Using Omber, it means 1507.03 / 0.6 = 2511.72 = 2511 units of Omber/cycle (per strip)

Since you re fitted with 3 strip miners, you will be getting 7533 units of Omber per cycle, or 150,660 of Omber per hour. This is a 26.75% increase over our previous Covetor fitted with T2 strips and T2 crystals. To go back even further, it is an 89.08% increase over the Apocalypse and 127.86% over our Retriever. Are you finally starting to think that all of that investment and training is paying off?

I have a feeling that you probably are but then, the CCP Gods blessed your mining career and showed you a path to the next step in the mining evolution, the Hulk.

7. The Mighty Hulk – Behold the beast!

It's big, it's sexy, it's powerful it is the Mighty Hulk!

Since the introduction of Exhumers, mining became even more profitable. The very nice thing about Exhumers is that once you can fly a Covetor, you re only a few days of training away from flying an Exhumer. 

The Skiff, the Mackinaw and the Hulk each have their area of expertise. The Skiff is used to mine Mercoxit, the Mackinaw specializes in mining Ice, and the Hulk chews on everything else. Since they are all so different, they will each get their own section.

The second biggest question after the battleship vs retriever debate is probably, "Is it worth it to buy a Hulk?"At the time the Exhumers were released they extremely sought after. The demand for them only rose, which means at one point the price of the Hulk actually increased, touching the 500 million ISK figure. It is now back down to around 100 million ISK, so it is very reasonable.

Simply put, the Hulk is a freaking mining monster. The ships name was not badly chosen to say the least. It gets a combined 20% improvement in yield over the Covetor, and can fit such a strong tank that it will repel pirates (even in 0.0) or small gankers (we have already seen interceptors dying to a Hulk).

Where does the 20% come from? Simply, from Exhumer 5 (15%) and the extra Mining Laser Upgrade the Hulk can fit. 

We will do the math again, for the heck of it. I assume you went from a maxed Covetor to a Hulk in the following equation:

360 * 1.25 * 1.25 * 1.15 * 1.15 * 1.15 * 1.05 * 1.05 * 1.05^2 * 1.75 = 1819.75 m3 / cycle Using Omber, it means 1819.75 / 0.6 = 3032.92 = 3032 units of Omber / cycle (per strip)

Since you re fitted with 3 strip miners, you will be getting 9096 units of Omber per cycle, or 181,920 units of Omber per hour. This is a 20.74% increase over our previous maxed Covetor. To go back to our roots, it is a whopping 175.14% increase over our old Retriever at the beginning. Can you say, oh my god?

So in essence, the three or four months of training, ISK and effort you put into your character has brought you a 175.14% increase in your yield. Care to ask me if it was worth it all again?

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

As I suggested when introducing the Hulk, it is not only a good miner, but it has a good tank as well. In fact, with the proper fittings, you can absolutely solo mine in 0.0 and tank the rats in the belts.

However, I suggest doing this at your own risk. I would not afk solo mine in a Hulk, in case the tank fails for one reason or another or you get ganked, it well be probably at least 500mil ISK or more out the window in a very short time.

This is the setup I used with great success when mining solo in 0.0, until I decided it stressed me too much and I got a Dominix alt to tank for me!

High slots -

3x T2 Strips

Med slots -

1x Gistii-A Small Shield Booster

1x Eutectic Cap Recharger

2x Gist-B NPC Specific Hardeners 

Low slots -

2x MLU

There is a lot to be said about that setup! First, this is the exact setup that works well enough that you can replace the hardeners with the regular Tech 1 named ones (for example, Anointed I EM Ward Reinforcement ), but the rest must stay as it is with. A Tech 2 Cap recharger won't fit on there, the Eutectic is the only thing that will. 

Second, don't even think about tanking in your half a billion ISK ship without proper engineering skills. You will absolutely need Electronics 5, and cap skills at level 4. This exact setup will leave you with 0 CPU (if it doesn't fit, try training Mining Upgrades up a few level) so you must absolutely use faction stuff. The Gistii booster is the key to the whole thing! 

Third, you need to stagger the strips (try an interval of 20 seconds) in order for the cap to sustain itself. You don't have to if you are using Tech 1 strip miners though. 

Finally, don't be afraid to lose a Mining Laser Upgrade and replace it with a Power Diagnostic Unit 2, or better, a faction Power Diagnostic Unit (True Sansha / Dark Blood) to make it a little thougher. If you cannot afford all those mods, don't bother trying to tank in your Hulk. This sub section was written to show you the Hulk is capable of tanking (and very well indeed), in fact, I tanked triple battleship spawns with its cruisers escort    but, it is not invincible, and don't come crying to me if you blow it up!

Skills you should now have: Exhumer IV, Mining Barge V, Astrogeology V, Mining V, Mining Foreman V, Refining V, Refinery Efficiency V, Metallurgy IV, [Metal] Ore Processing IV

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