The Miners life - The wild west prospecting adventure - or not yet?

[Darth Ender]

I'd just like to discuss actual experience mining in the latest patch and if it's finally a viable means to play the game. I really want to be a bounty hunter who's seen too much horrible violence so has taken up mining but in a ship that is sorta suited to dish out pain when needed. So my question to all the new miners out there are the following:

Has anyone found some painite roids?

I assume micro-managing of the refinery for no good reason still exists...correct?

If you manage to find a decent field (gold, platinum, paladium, etc), how long does it take to mine say 300ton?

How many limpets do you need for such a haul and does anyone care to use the prospector limpet? Assume a class controller

Do you get pirate interference and is it often enough to keep you from wishing you could jettison your annoying refinery into space and shoot it to death?

 

[IronGremlin]

Resources extraction sites effectively guarantee at least NPC piracy.

Painite is not terribly rare.

Collection drones are very useful, but don't quite collect at the rate you can make chunks.

Bin management is, if anything, worse, due to 3 mineral roids.

If you're prospecting with drones you will most likely run out of drones prior to filling your hold. They make things marginally faster because roid chunks don't always have the full spread of all minerals in the roid, so one shot may not give you the whole story.

I can't give you solid per hour numbers, but filling x cargo space is faster than it was if you're using collection drones.

Depending on distance to point of sale, iy may make more sense to pack both types of drones and mine until you run out as opposed to until you have a full hold - acquiring x tons is faster with drones, therefore it may make more sense to restock drones then to continue mining at the slower rate.

 

[Rosebloome]

Painite is so-so in rarity. A little hard to find, depending on your rng.

Micromanaging is probbly one of the few things you actively do as a miner. Its honestly not that bad, as long as you have a big bin refinery. I have a 7, about to upgrade to a 9 bin soon. 9 bins will hold everything in a pristine metallic ring's ore drop table.

I'd guess, if you mine everything and keep everything. Going as fast as possible, in a high res, can probably fill 100t in an hour. Possibly.

I don't bother with prospector. I goto asteriod. Mine it til its dry, keep everything, move on. No point in skipping, even if its just bert or indite. Money is money. Probably 15-20 limpets per 100 tons if you solo. If you're in a wing, bring alot more. currently theres a bug that if a wing mate is within less than 8km or you, your limpets will lag and have a chance to explode on your hull when returning ore. Server problems or coding i guess with wings. No idea why. I use a 1A controller. 1 limpet works for me. could speed up the time frmae i guess with multi limpet controllers.

Pirates are annoying at res sites. If you want a safe mining experience, just drop out of cruise at the planet ring far from a res site. no pirates anywhere near usually.

 

[Anuranium]

Has anyone found some painite roids?
Yes, in pristine Metallic rings.

I assume micro-managing of the refinery for no good reason still exists...correct?
Yes, although, there is less micro managing if you have the A4 refinery, 10 bins pretty much covers the various metals and I seldom bother with keeping the minerals.

If you manage to find a decent field (gold, platinum, paladium, etc), how long does it take to mine say 300ton?
Haven't done 300ton, but I have filled my 128 tons under an hour. I'm just starting in this business so I'm sure there could be shortcuts made to make the process more efficient.

How many limpets do you need for such a haul and does anyone care to use the prospector limpet? Assume a class controller
I can easily fill 128 tons with 40 limpets, maybe less. I use 2xA5 collector modules, giving me 6 drones to do the work. Oh, and I don't use prospector droids. I just mine a chunk or two off, and if it's no good, I move on.

Do you get pirate interference and is it often enough to keep you from wishing you could jettison your annoying refinery into space and shoot it to death?
NPC pirates in RES'? Yes. Although this is completely avoidable by just mining besides the RES or choosing a place randomly in the ring. Wingmates to farm the pirates is recommended (and good teamplay) alternatively fit turreted weapons, put 4 pips to shields and let them work their magic.

 

[tomalus]

Im totally gonna try out using 12 limpets with my conda tomorrow, to test the new patch. I doubt 12 will coexist well but lets try