But I Love My Procurer!

Last week I pointed out how moving mining products around low sec is going to change.  In order to move the results of one hour of mining in a Procurer used to just take one trip in a Prorator or Viator will now require running a Miasmos due to the differences of transporting minerals versus ore.  Okay, fine.  This is EVE Online and when things don't go your way, the operative saying is "HTFU."  So I've worked on a fit I think will work and am practicing the cloak/MWD trick.  Low sec became a little more dangerous, but I can handle it.

Then yesterday, CCP Fozzie made a post in the Features and Ideas section of the forums concerning changes to mining barges and exhumers.  Here's the reaction from Goonswarm's high sec division, Miniluv.

I want to believe "@CCP_Fozzie: Mining Barge and Exhumer updates! https://t.co/t2Jlty6AIJ #tweetfleet #eveonline"
— Powers (@Powersv2) April 1, 2014

That's usually not a good sign for miners of any stripe.  When I got home and started running the numbers on my Procurer, I found out why.

My Current Procurer Fit In Low Sec

I have put my current fit in.  Sometimes I swap out the MWD for an additional Adaptive Invulnerability Field II.  If I think I'll get attacked by battleship rats, I'll swap in a long point to make sure the rat doesn't get away.  Either way, I fit a Damage Control II and a nano in the lows to increase my chances of survival.  This fit doesn't come close to maximizing my mining yield, but if you can't get the ore back in the station, why mine in the first place?  I'm happy with the ability to fill up the ore hold about 5 times an hour.

Looking at the changes, when I could finally concentrate on them, didn't make me happy.  First, the bonus to strip miner yield dropped from 200% to 150%.  That's a significant decrease.  Also, a mid slot was removed and a low slot added.  Considering what CCP was doing to the ship, they needed to do that.  The base velocity was increased from 90 meters/sec to 160 meters/sec, which hopefully will make up for not having a prop mod on the ship because the slot was removed.  Of course, that's while I'm mining.  While traveling, I'll put the survey scanner in the cargo hold.

Two other nice additions was expanding the drone bay to hold 2 flights of light drones instead of one and reducing the signature radius down to 150 from 200.  Now the ship can carry a flight of light scouts to fight off NPCs and a flight of light ECM drones in case a player tackles me before I can escape.

What really has me upset is the nerf to mining yield.  Oh, I can get the same mining yield as before, but I have to sacrifice survivability to do so.

The above yields were calculated using Wandering Rose's skills.  The Rubicon fit's yield pictured earlier in this post was calculated not only by the Eve Fitting Tool, but using a formula in a spreadsheet I have and is the number displayed on the tool tip in game.  They all matched, so I'm assuming my calculations for the yields using the figures from the proposal are accurate.  Here are the assumptions...

• Mining trained to 5.
• Astrogeology trained to 5.
• Mining Barge trained to 5.
• Miner is using tech 2 crystals.
• Miner is in a gang and the squad commander is giving a 10% bonus to mining yield.

Now, the difference in the yield between my current fit and the proposal CCP Fozzie posted in the forums that has 2 Mining Laser Upgrade IIs fit is less than 1 minute of mining.  I'll call that even.  Some people will tell me that because I broke even that this change is not a nerf.  But in order to fit 2 MLU IIs, I will have to either give up a nano or a Damage Control II from my current fit.  I think I'll wind up giving up the DCII, even though, according to EFT I will give up 24% of my effective hit points.  But in low sec, I feel align time and the ability to get out of the area trumps tank and firepower.  I just need to be careful of those occasional gangs of NPC rats that want to scram and web me.  That's when that extra EHP really comes in handy.  I can take losing a ship to a player.  But to belt rats?  Ugh!

The miners I really feel sorry for are those in high sec that try to tank their ships.  I don't like mining in high sec because miners are just sitting ducks.  Now, they either have to put up with a nerf to their mining yield or a nerf to their tanks.

I haven't run the numbers on the ships most used by botters, Mackinaws and Retrievers.  Given that CCP Fozzie posted that the yields on those ships are receiving a nerf, I expect a lot of unhappy botters come this summer.  But until I can run those numbers to cheer myself up, I'll just have to listen to Mr. G's advice.