Posted by Kromey at 1:07pm Feb 29 '12Veldspar is perhaps the most common asteroid ore you can find. It's the first one you'll find, being damn near the only one to exist in 1.0 space. Thus, most people move on and avoid it just as soon as they can get to other, supposedly more profitable ores.
However, if you spend a few hours training reprocessing efficiency, get yourself to the point where you can get as close to 100% yield as possible with veldspar (IIRC, that's level 3 in the generic ore reprocessing skill, and just level 1 in the veldspar reprocessing skill), the amount of trit you recover makes it considerably more profitable than any other ore out there. For this reason, the ore itself (if you can't refine it with reasonable efficiency yourself) is also highly valuable.
Even if you're not building a miner pilot, it's a quick, easy, and pretty safe way to make some ISK after your latest and greatest ship just got blown away in your latest adventure. It's also dirt cheap to have a good mining frigate just hanging out in your hangar for those slow days when you just want to zone out.
Another mining-related tip (only relevant to high-sec space): You'll almost invariably get into "jet-can mining" (mine a cycle of ore, then jettison it; open the jettison can you just created, and drag every cycle of ore into it as you go -- it's the most efficient way to mine if you don't have an Orca pilot supporting you), and when you do you will eventually encounter "can tippers". These assholes will fly right up to your jet-can in cheap little frigates, oftentimes using very young alts so they look just like newbs, and steal your ore. This will flag them as valid targets for you to then shoot, with no consequences. Well, none except that the moment you open fire, the rest of his gang and/or corp will warp in in their cruisers and battleships and tear you apart before you even know what hit you!!
Also beware of suicide gankers (again only relevant in high-sec space). One tactic I saw them use was similar to can-tipping: they'd warp in with a cheap, disposable frigate and shoot you. Concord would of course appear and vaporize them in short order, but if you shot back even once their corpmates would have free reign to blow you away without consequence! This was generally considered an exploit, though, so it may not longer be a workable tactic, although you will see more "traditional" suicide gankers: they zip in and blow up your ship before Concord can arrive to save your ass, then their buddies hanging out on the fringes would swoop in and loot all the wreckage. This was always a big concern for haulers (and the big reason why AFK autopiloting is always a bad idea), less so for others unless you've got tier 2 equipment.
Generic tip: ALWAYS pay attention to your alignment, especially if you're flying one of the heavier, slower ships. This means that you should pick your "emergency getaway" point, and set your ship to already be pointed toward it (and already in motion if possible), so that you can warp out as quickly as possible. (This got a lot easier when they added the "align to" option to the game, allowing you to select any celestial object or bookmark and automatically align on it and gun your engines.) If you don't have a safe spot bookmarked in the system already, use a random planet (and always at the maximum warp to distance); even with the advent of PI, it's still safer to warp to a planet than a moon (the latter may drop you into a hostile POS's lap, whereas even if there are hostile ships at the former, odds are you'll have a considerable chunk of the planet between you and them). Of course, if you're in high-sec space, you can jump to a station and dock up in an emergency.
Can't really give you any combat tips, and certainly no PvP tips, because I never really got far into that. I spent most of my time mining, trading, hauling, exploring, and dabbling a little into PI.
...Dammit, now you're making me wish I was playing again!
However, if you spend a few hours training reprocessing efficiency, get yourself to the point where you can get as close to 100% yield as possible with veldspar (IIRC, that's level 3 in the generic ore reprocessing skill, and just level 1 in the veldspar reprocessing skill), the amount of trit you recover makes it considerably more profitable than any other ore out there. For this reason, the ore itself (if you can't refine it with reasonable efficiency yourself) is also highly valuable.
Even if you're not building a miner pilot, it's a quick, easy, and pretty safe way to make some ISK after your latest and greatest ship just got blown away in your latest adventure. It's also dirt cheap to have a good mining frigate just hanging out in your hangar for those slow days when you just want to zone out.
Another mining-related tip (only relevant to high-sec space): You'll almost invariably get into "jet-can mining" (mine a cycle of ore, then jettison it; open the jettison can you just created, and drag every cycle of ore into it as you go -- it's the most efficient way to mine if you don't have an Orca pilot supporting you), and when you do you will eventually encounter "can tippers". These assholes will fly right up to your jet-can in cheap little frigates, oftentimes using very young alts so they look just like newbs, and steal your ore. This will flag them as valid targets for you to then shoot, with no consequences. Well, none except that the moment you open fire, the rest of his gang and/or corp will warp in in their cruisers and battleships and tear you apart before you even know what hit you!!
Also beware of suicide gankers (again only relevant in high-sec space). One tactic I saw them use was similar to can-tipping: they'd warp in with a cheap, disposable frigate and shoot you. Concord would of course appear and vaporize them in short order, but if you shot back even once their corpmates would have free reign to blow you away without consequence! This was generally considered an exploit, though, so it may not longer be a workable tactic, although you will see more "traditional" suicide gankers: they zip in and blow up your ship before Concord can arrive to save your ass, then their buddies hanging out on the fringes would swoop in and loot all the wreckage. This was always a big concern for haulers (and the big reason why AFK autopiloting is always a bad idea), less so for others unless you've got tier 2 equipment.
Generic tip: ALWAYS pay attention to your alignment, especially if you're flying one of the heavier, slower ships. This means that you should pick your "emergency getaway" point, and set your ship to already be pointed toward it (and already in motion if possible), so that you can warp out as quickly as possible. (This got a lot easier when they added the "align to" option to the game, allowing you to select any celestial object or bookmark and automatically align on it and gun your engines.) If you don't have a safe spot bookmarked in the system already, use a random planet (and always at the maximum warp to distance); even with the advent of PI, it's still safer to warp to a planet than a moon (the latter may drop you into a hostile POS's lap, whereas even if there are hostile ships at the former, odds are you'll have a considerable chunk of the planet between you and them). Of course, if you're in high-sec space, you can jump to a station and dock up in an emergency.
Can't really give you any combat tips, and certainly no PvP tips, because I never really got far into that. I spent most of my time mining, trading, hauling, exploring, and dabbling a little into PI.
...Dammit, now you're making me wish I was playing again!
Don't knock the veldspar - Kromey