Thursday, February 2, 2012

Easily Distracted by Bright Shiny Objects


Coming up on my first anniversary (not sure exactly when), I’m still enjoying Eve very much.  Pirating has been a bit slow lately – though I wander around low sec every day to see if I can get into trouble.  Usually I can’t.  But I’ve also been easily distracted by other activities…

My trader alts (three of them) are buying and selling in Jita and also doing some regional trading in less active areas.  This was taking up a lot of my time for a while, but I’ve backed off the efforts lately and don’t always update orders on a daily basis.  But the income they generated resulted in more than enough rifters for Jack Dancer to fly (hundreds of them now spread across dozens of systems in 3 or 4 regions!) and also added shiny modules to my mission runner’s Dominix.  I had thoughts of trading for enough isk to buy 2 PLEX a month to finance my two accounts – but we’ll see if that works out or not.  Especially with PLEX prices climbing again, I’m not sure I want to invest the time in the traders. 

My mission runner is now doing level 4 missions comfortably – rarely having to panic and warp away thanks to a hefty (and expensive) tank in the Dominix.  I have an alt that can follow with a noctis to do the salvaging (though I learned that I should be leery of those pesky webbing/scrambling frigates that can result in a pile of noctis rubble if they target the salvager instead of the mission ship!  Having the pile of isks from my traders made that experience less painful than it might have been…). 

And finally, my mission runner (who doubles as an explorer) managed to find a wormhole that exited into a pocket of high sec systems that are totally surrounded by low and null sec.  I put a jump clone in this isolated pocket of high sec systems with a selection of exploration/combat ships and it’s been a lot of fun!  I use a helios to find hidden signatures and a Vexor or Myrm to clear them.  The competition isn’t too bad and the systems feel very isolated.  The only problem is finding a market for the loot that I gather – it has started to pile up (My entry wormhole, of course, has collapsed and I haven’t found a wormhole out to high sec markets since then…).  One of these days I may end up sneaking out through a dozen low sec jumps in my cloaky helios with a hold full of isk-producing items…  That should make for some serious adrenalin consumption…

So, as you can see, all these bright shiny objects, errr... activities, have distracted me a bit from Jack Dancer's Death to Flying Things Campaign.  But I'm still working on the infamous "Rifter Plan" skills (about half are at level V now with the other half all at level IV).  I still very much enjoy flying rifters in search of illegal miners, industrial smugglers, and pilots engaged in unlawful activities.  And I'm sure I'll have some tales of adventure to relate here sometime soon...

I think in the end, what it all boils down to is that Eve is great fun because there is such a variety of interesting activities.

3 comments:

  1. 1) I can't seem to make the profits people are talking about with my trader alt...starting to wonder what I'm doing wrong.

    2)You can leave a Jump Clone in WH space? Tell me how!?!?!

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  2. Thanks for the comments.

    As to trading, I have been successful with a trader in Jita and 40+ orders - I update the orders in the morning and at night - twice a day for about 20 minutes. I think I've made about 2 billion in profits in the past 6 months starting with about 50 or 100 million or so. But it can be very slow going when you start. Don't expect to be buying a PLEX with your massive profits after the first month or two - it probably won't happen!

    At first I went through items and looked for modules that PvPers are always blowing up (especially meta 2 and meta 3 items - armor, shields, guns, missile launchers, etc.). Often there's a good profit margin on them - like 50% or better. Stay away from T2 modules as they usually (but not always) aren't as profitable. I also made a good profit on some of the implants (but some never move and are worthless for trade). And look over other items that you might not recognize in the market to see if you can find something with reasonable profits and enough activity to make them worth trading. My original post on station trading is here: http://jackdancer.blogspot.com/2011/07/station-trading.html - I'd recommend getting acquainted with the graph feature as it can often show you at a glance if the item is of interest. You'll have to spend time just wandering through the market looking for items to trade (use the "browse" tab (I think that's the name)). It takes time to find a group of profitable and active items to trade - and even then they sometimes become unprofitable due to market factors or Eve updates.

    Good luck!

    As to Jump Clones in WH space - I believe you are right (but I'm not a wormhole space expert - it's too scary for me...). In this case, what I found was a wormhole from high sec to the high sec pocket that's surrounded by low sec and null sec (wormholes don't always exit in Wormhole Space - they sometimes exit in high sec, low sec, and null sec). And what I'm now looking for is a wormhole that exits in high sec space so that I can get my loot to market.

    Thanks again for the questions!

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  3. Mmm, maybe I'm not doing too bad then. Made 20mil profit from 30mil in 2 weeks. Thanks for the great guide though, helped alot.

    As far as the JC's in wormholes is concerned, I misread your sentance:
    "I put a jump clone in this isolated pocket of high sec systems with a selection of exploration/combat ships and it’s been a lot of fun!"
    I thought you placed a JC inside wormhole space, something which is impossible as far as I know.

    This conversation is bringing back urges to shoot at sleepers...

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