Difference between revisions of "PVE School"

Revision as of 20:35, 13 June 2023

Gooniversity Departments
New Players	PVE	PVP	Exploration	Industry
Newbee Survival School	PVE School	PVP School	School of Exploration	Industry School

Welcome

Shooting red triangles and diamonds for fun and profit, this is what the player vs. environment experience in EVE Online is all about. Until recently, it was fairly boring, predictable and lacked nuance. But now, with the abyss, Pochven, diamond rats, drifters, sleepers, and ded sites, combat exploration sites, the agency, & more - New Eden keeps coming up with new and better ways to kill you. This guide will go over some favorites with a predictably goon flavor of focussing on min/max. There will be links to other references when applicable and as always if something is wrong or out of date feel free to contact the wiki janitor staff to clean it up.

Best Practices for PVE Sites

Player versus Environment gameplay is an important part of EVE Online's economy. Salvage, minerals, ammo, meta modules, tags, DED Space modules, officer modules, and more all come from ratting. A player can start down this path on their very first day ingame and while some aspects have changed from time to time the overall experience remains the same. Shoot red triangles to collect bounties and loot.

Best Practices

Know your damage profile according to the Ratting Reference Page and make sure you are fit accordingly.
Fly the right ship/fit for the site. If you aren't sure, check the Ratting Reference Page.
Bring a mobile tractor unit to help speed up the looting salvaging process.
Salvage! Whether you do it on an alt or bring a mobile depot to refit a Salvager I, you'll be leaving a decent amount of money on the field if you don't. For those who could care less and are lazy members of the Imperium, there are generally plenty of people who will buy salvage on contract via buyback programs.
Refit accordingly. It's generally a good idea to bring a mobile depot to refit. Moving around multiple system in unknown space it's generally a good idea to either (1) not do that or (2) bring a cloak & warp core stabilizer to refit into.
Bring Nanite Paste. Have Thermodynamics 1 trained and bring nanite paste so you can overheat your guns and or shields if you find yourself in a bind. The nanite paste will help you repair it so you can burn it out all over again!
Watch intel. Know the risks. Read The Intel Guide to learn more about watching intel.

Ratting Etiquette 101

Encounter Surveillance System

Do not mess with the ESS. You will be removed from the alliance. End of story.

A little note on ESS drama: we are uninterested in the excuses of anyone who spends 3.5 minutes to 'take all' on an ESS and claim it's a misclick. It takes enough time and effort to steal that it's obvious and notorious goonfucking. To cut down on bullshit we will simply :commissar: you from the alliance.

First Come, First Serve

The first person to arrive at an anomaly has the right to any rats he finds there. This includes mining ops; if you stumble into a mining operation already in progress, don't fuck up their shit. You killing their rats means they have to deal with warping out and possibly losing ships to rats when they respawn instead of just tanking them with a designated ship.

Note that you can use a narrow-angle Direction Scan to check if there's anyone else in an anomaly you're interested in. Direction Scans work up to 14AU, and if you first lock your tracking camera on it (default shortcut is "C") and manipulate the angle of the scan right down to 5º you can often avoid catching anything in-between and see if any player ships are in that anomaly before you warp in on them. This is generally a good scouting skill to learn. If you need to first get closer look out for celestial bodies like planets (avoid using moons) which may be within 14AU. Dragging the left mouse button around in space will reset the camera focus back to your ship.

Claiming Rats

While ratting please keep in mind that calling or claiming rats is not allowed. If someone gives a shout out in local that there are rats in a belt, those rats are up for grabs. You cannot "call" them or "claim" them. While it is acceptable to let someone know that you're on your way, if you get there and someone is already taking care of them, move on. It is always a good idea to let someone in trouble with rats know that someone is coming whether you get there first or not.

Named Wrecks or Cans

You may salvage or loot any unattended wrecks or cans you find, unless they are named. If they are unnamed and the owner is nowhere to be found, you are welcome to them.

Don't be a dick

This rule is pretty self evident but often needs to get repeated from time to time. Repeated offenders will be booted, possibly doomsday'd depending on how IA is feeling.

Skill Plans and Ship types

Below is a general skill plan for killing NPCs with ease. It is by no means an end point but rather a starting point. Every ship from a mining barge to a Battleship needs drone skills and defensive abilities. This will give you a fairly decent start on killing things with drones but it lacks in other turrets so that part can be up to the user.

Drones II
Drones III
Drones IV
Drones V
Drone Avionics II
Drone Avionics III
Drone Interfacing I
Drone Interfacing II
Drone Interfacing III
Heavy Drone Operation I
Heavy Drone Operation II
Heavy Drone Operation III
Medium Drone Operation I
Medium Drone Operation II
Medium Drone Operation III
Capacitor Systems Operation IV
Capacitor Management IV
Energy Grid Upgrades II
Energy Grid Upgrades III
Energy Grid Upgrades IV
Weapon Upgrades III
Weapon Upgrades IV
Gallente Destroyer I
Gallente Destroyer II
Gallente Destroyer III
Gallente Cruiser I
Gallente Cruiser II
Gallente Cruiser III
Gallente Battlecruiser I
Gallente Battlecruiser II
Gallente Battlecruiser III
Capacitor Systems Operation V
Medium Drone Operation IV
Medium Drone Operation V
Hull Upgrades IV
Resistance Phasing I
Resistance Phasing II
Resistance Phasing III
Resistance Phasing IV
Repair Systems IV
Afterburner I
Afterburner II
Afterburner III
Fuel Conservation I
Fuel Conservation II
Fuel Conservation III
Navigation IV
Warp Drive Operation I
Warp Drive Operation II
Micro Jump Drive Operation I
Afterburner IV
Fuel Conservation IV

Ship Types

Ratting ships fall into 2 main categories based on tank types - active tanks and passive tanks.

Active Tanked Ships

These ships require a shield or armor booster running, replenishing hit points, in order to deal with incoming damage. These ships are generally more labor intensive than passive tanked ships.

Example.jpg

Passive Tanked ships

These ships have incredibly high shield recharge rate and typically go fast while depending on drones as their main source of damage.

Example.jpg

Total time: 41 days, 12 hours, 50 minutes, 30 seconds

Ratting Guides

Abyssal Deadspace

The Abyss is a timed (20 minute) PVE experience like no other in EVE Online. It has three rooms and if you fail you lose your ship and your pod with all its fancy implants. It has tiers of difficulty, and an AI that you'll be thankful is not operating in regular parts of space. Enter at your own risk but if you succeed, you'll probably want to do it again... and again.

Combat Anomalies

see exploration, shout out to Imperium Expeditions

Cosmic Anomalies

EVE University has a pretty good starting place for general ratting in their Ratting 101 guide. For specific information about killing Blood Raiders in Imperium space look no further: Delve Ratting 101.

DED Escalation Sites

Mission Running

Officer Hunting

Incursions

Wormhole Combat Sites

See The School of Exploration.

Mining

The fine art of extracting isk from the very space around you by shooting rocks.

Advantages

Low entry cost: Gooniveristy provides a free venture for ore mining
Low level of involvement needed: In most scenarios, miners only need to be active 5 seconds for every 3 minutes (to target new asteroids) and an extra 1 minute for every 30 minutes (to unload the full cargo of mined ore in station).
Guaranteed income: Mining products are always in high demand because ships and structures are constantly being destroyed and replaced, and replacing ships and structures requires materials.
Fun factor: Mining in fleets is often a very social activity.

Disadvantages

Skill intensive: Despite the low entry cost, it takes a lot of training time to become an efficient miner.
Non-transferable skills: Mining skills are useful only for mining.
Fun factor: Solo mining, in particular, can be less than exciting. Mining fleets can provide conversation with other players in comms, but there usually isn't much going on otherwise.

Imperium and Goonswarm Rules

Mechanics

The basic mechanics of mining are very simple: Fit your ship with a mining module, approach and target an asteroid, and activate your mining module. At the end of each cycle (usually between 1 and 3 minutes, depending on the module used), the ore mined is automatically deposited in your ship's cargo or mining hold. The mining module will then automatically continue mining until either your cargo/mining hold is full, or the asteroid has been "mined out" (all the available ore in that asteroid has been mined and it disappears). Make sure that you keep the asteroid within range of your mining module (usually by stopping your ship, or orbiting the asteroid) - if you are too far away, the mining module will finish its current cycle regardless, but you will receive no ore.

If you're using mining drones, launch your drones once you are near the asteroid, and give them the command to "mine repeatedly". They will then fly to the asteroid you have targeted, mine for one cycle (60 seconds), fly back to your ship, deposit the ore they have mined in your cargo or mining hold, then automatically fly back to the asteroid and continue mining it (until, as above, either your cargo/mining hold is full, or the asteroid has depleted because it no longer contains any ore). Since the drones have to fly back and forth repeatedly between your ship and the asteroid, it's worth flying as close as possible to the asteroid to keep their travel time down to a minimum.

Once your cargo or mining hold is full, bring the ore you have mined to a station (either fly there yourself or transfer the ore to another player's ship to fly back (see solo mining and cooperative mining for more details)), then return to the asteroids and continue mining!

Mining Modules

Each category of mining module (basic ore miners, deep core ore miners, ore strip miners, deep core ore strip miners, ice mining lasers, ice harvesters, and gas cloud harvesters) includes a number of different modules which fulfill the same purpose, but some have better performance than others. In other words, mining yield can be increased by using higher-quality mining modules (i.e. modules with a higher yield). The downside is that higher-performance modules may have higher fitting requirements, may require additional skills to be trained, and are usually (but not always) more expensive.

Ore miners, in particular, have a large selection of mining modules to choose from. In addition to the improved (higher-meta, Tech 2 or Faction) versions available of each mining module, ore miners can also fit Strip Miners (which can mine several times more than basic ore mining lasers, but can only be used on Mining Barges and Exhumers) and Deep Core Miners (which are needed to mine Mercoxit, a very rare type of ore). Additionally, "modulated" ore mining modules can be fitted with mining crystals.

Mining Lasers harvest asteroids, and are the most basic mining module. They have a cycle time of 60 seconds. Note that these require a free turret slot on a ship, and can therefore not be fitted to Mining Barges or Exhumers (which use Strip Miners instead).
- Tech I Variants can be used anywhere
- Tech II Variants can only be used where permitted due to their waste mechanic and are not allowed on ANY Locust Moon Mining Operations
- ORE Miner Has No Waste and greater yields making it the preferred mining module

Deep Core Miners These are specialized variants of mining lasers, and are needed to mine Mercoxit (the rarest kind of ore, only found in nullsec). Whilst they are capable of mining other kinds of ore, they are less efficient at it (lower yield) than normal mining lasers. The Modulated Deep Core Miner II has a cycle time of 180 seconds; the others have cycle times of 60 seconds.

Ice Mining Lasers These modules allow expedition frigates (the Endurance and the Prospect) to harvest ice. They operate on very long cycle times and all have the same yield per cycle (1,000m³).
- Tech I Variants can be used anywhere
- Tech II Variants can only be used where permitted due to their waste mechanic
- ORE Miner Has No Waste and greater range making it the preferred mining module

Strip Miners can only be fit on mining barges and exhumers, and are used to mine ore. Unlike mining lasers, they have a cycle time of 180 seconds (3 minutes); the table below lists their mining yield in m3/min (whereas in-game tools often list their yield in m3 per cycle).
- Tech I Variants can be used anywhere
- Tech II Variants can only be used where permitted due to their waste mechanic and are not allowed on ANY Locust Moon Mining Operations
- ORE Miner Has No Waste and greater yields making it the preferred mining module

Ice miners These modules are used to mine ice (surprise, surprise), and, like strip miners, can only be fitted to mining barges and exhumers. Unlike ore miners, ice miners all mine 1 unit (1000 m3) of ice per cycle; their distinguishing feature is the length of their cycle (a shorter cycle means more ice mined over time).
- Tech I Variants can be used anywhere
- Tech II Variants can only be used where permitted due to their waste mechanic
- ORE Miner Has No Waste and greater range making it the preferred mining module

Gas Cloud Harvesters are used to mine gas clouds, and can only be fit to ships with turret slots (which means they cannot be fitted to mining barges or exhumers). For each level of the Gas Cloud Harvesting skill you can fit one additional gas cloud harvester (up to a total of 5 at skill level V); all gas cloud miners have a range of 1.5 km (the shortest of any of the mining modules by quite a margin). Note that the table below lists yield per minute (to make it easier to compare modules), while most in-game sources will list yield per cycle.
- Tech I Variants can be used anywhere
- Tech II Variants can only be used where permitted due to their waste mechanic
- ORE Miner Has No Waste and greater range making it the preferred mining module

Waste Mechanics

"Residue" takes away from the overall units of that node being mined, it should really be called "waste" as its essentially being thrown away.

Example 1: A node has 100 units, you mined 10 with 0 residue the node now has 90 units available.
Example 2: A node has 100 units, you mined 10 with 10 residue the node now has 80 units available.

It does not affect your amount per cycle delivered into your ship, it just affects the overall amount of units the node after each mining cycle which in turn affect the overall value of that node by reducing the total amount of units you can mine from it.

Mining on any R32 or R64 moon with modules that have a residue or waste mechanic is not permitted

Mining Crystals

Crystals are divided into the into 6 tiers of standard asteroid ore types, and the standard moon ore tiers. Within each tier, the crystals are further divided into 3 types with a Tech I and II variant for each type. Mining crystals can only be used on modulated ore mining modules (any Tech II module with "modulated" in its name) and the ORE deep core mining laser, and increase mining yield when mining a particular kind of ore (but give no benefit when mining another kind of ore). They are loaded into the mining modules (like ammunition) and have a limited lifespan before they break and must be replaced with new crystals.

Type A Crystals have moderate yield and residue bonuses, and are the most balanced crystals for standard mining operations.
Type B Crystals have much improved yield bonuses, however, they also get a correspondingly high residue probability level to match. These crystals therefore will have a high mining yield but waste more ore in the process. The lower duration results in faster extraction.
- DO NOT USE - Type C Crystals are not for standard mining operations. They have extremely low yields with extremely high residue, making them suitable for strategic ore removal or for offensive mining operations against hostile player space. These crystals are also used to quickly raise the industry ADM in a system.

Activity Defense Multiplier & Mining

The length of time it takes to reinforce a structure or capture a command node depends on the Activity Defense Multiplier (ADM) for the system. This rewards an alliance for holding and being active in the system, making it easier for them to defend. The base timer for the structure is multiplied by the ADM to give the total amount of (uncontested) time required for an attacker to reinforce a structure or capture a command node. The time taken for a defender to regen a structure or capture a command node is unaffected by the ADM.

The ADM is calculated based on the value of 3 defensive indices:

Strategic Index: Automatically increases as you hold control of the I-Hub over a continuous period.
Military Index: Increases in proportion to the number of NPC ships killed in the system.
Industrial Index: Increases in proportion to the volume of ore mined in the system.

The Level of the Industrial Index determines the ore mining anomalies that will spawn in a system

Industrial Index Level 1 - Small
Industrial Index Level 2 - Medium
Industrial Index Level 3 - Large
Industrial Index Level 4 - Enormous
Industrial Index Level 5 - Colossal

What can be Mined?

Asteroids and Ore

As their name suggests, asteroids are primarily found in asteroid belts, and most systems in New Eden have at least one. Asteroid belts can be viewed in the overview when enabled, and can also be viewed via the contextual menu by right-clicking in space. Each asteroid belt is composed of a variety of asteroids, each containing a particular type of ore noted in asteroid's name.

Cosmic Anomalies Ore Sites Are viewable from your probe scanner window and are ore sites that contain asteroids to be mined for minerals or ice products; the ore often includes types not normally found in systems of that security rating, i.e. anomalies in high sec may contain low sec ore, etc.
Mercoxit Mining Can only be mined with Deep Core mining modules (any module with "deep core" in its name). In order to use these modules you need to train Deep Core Mining, and whilst they can be used to mine other types of ore, they are less efficient at it than "normal" mining modules. Mercoxit mining has one other notable feature: when you mine a Mercoxit asteroid, it will randomly release a cloud of toxic gas which will damage your ship if you're caught in it. Fortunately, the cloud only forms within 5 km of the asteroid, so keep your ship further away to escape any damage (note that this precludes you from using the basic Deep Core Mining Laser I module, as it has a maximum range of only 5 km). Alternatively, you can train Deep Core Mining, which reduces the chance of a cloud forming by 20% per skill level - in other words, at Deep Core Mining V, no clouds will form when you mine Mercoxit.
Rats will spawn randomly while you are mining in asteroid belts or Cosmic Anomalies. There is no mechanic at this time that will cause the spawns to stop after a certain number have spawned.
Compression: can be obtained from Upwell structures with active Standup Reprocessing Facilities, Porpoise, Orca, and Rorqual
Respawn Rates on Cosmic Anomalies:
- Asteroid Belts: Will refresh after down time every day. It is best to give them about 1 to 2 hours as the rocks "grow" in amount during this time
- Colossals respawn 5 hours after the last rock is mined out in the same system it was in unless the industry index falls below the minimum needed for it to spawn
- Enormous respawn 4 hours after the last rock is mined out in the same system it was in unless the industry index falls below the minimum needed for it to spawn
- Large respawn 2 hours after the last rock is mined out in the same system it was in unless the industry index falls below the minimum needed for it to spawn
- Medium respawn 1 hour after the last rock is mined out in the same system it was in unless the industry index falls below the minimum needed for it to spawn
- Small respawn 20 minutes after the last rock is mined out in the same system it was in unless the industry index falls below the minimum needed for it to spawn

Gas (AKA Gas Huffing)

Gas cloud harvesting is the process of collecting gas from interstellar clouds. Players harvest (or "huff") gas in known space or in wormhole space, and collect it with a gas cloud harvester module. Note that although the in-game probing window classifies "chemical labs" as a type of gas site, they are actually combat-and-hacking locations, and should be avoided by gas harvesting ships.

Nebulas Are scanned using Core Scanning Probes and located in Known Space. Most Nebula sites will display a pop-up message when warped to. This can be useful to determine if a bookmark is still connected to an active site or if it has despawned. The message's title will be the name of the type of gas within the site.
- Gas that are in Known Space: Mykoserocin, Cytoserocin,
- Gas found in Wormholes: Fullerenes
Rats: Check the Gas Cloud Harvesting Nebula for information on the waves and types
Compression: can be obtained from Upwell structures with active Standup Reprocessing Facilities, Porpoise, Orca, and Rorqual
- NOTE: Uncompressed Gas sells for more isk than compressed
Respawn Rates:
- Mykoserocin and Cytoserocin nebulae are not randomly distributed throughout space. Each flavor of gas will be concentrated in one constellation of one region, and some regions will never have a nebula appear.
- Fullerenes gas sites spawn in all classes of wormhole.

Wormhole Sites

These sites are found inside wormholes that are scanned down in Known Space. Wormholes can provide gas harvesting and ore mining once entered. The minable sites come in variations that provide different resources based on the classification of the wormhole it is found in. Wormholes are classified from 1 to 6 (C1-C6) and in each Class there are unique interactable features in addition to minable items.

Gas Sites: Perimeter (in C1-C4), Frontier (in C3-C6), and Core (in C5, C6, and Shattered Systems only)
Ore Sites: Perimeter (in all W-Space), Frontier (in all W-Space), and Core (in C5, C6 and may spawn in Shattered Systems)
Ice Belts: Shattered Ice Fields may spawn in Shattered Systems
Rats: Check the information on each site to find out the spawn rate and type
Compression: is the same as mentioned for each of the minable items

Ice Harvesting (AKA Licking)

Ice harvesting is the process of obtaining resources from ice fields (commonly called "ice belts"). This mined ice can then be refined and used to fuel capital ship jump drives, manufacture fuel for player-owned starbases and structure services, and light cynosural fields.Unlike the various ore mining tools, ice harvesting tools always harvest one block of ice (with a volume of 1000 m3) per cycle; because of this, the best method of harvesting ice more efficiently is to decrease the ice harvesters' cycle times.

The ice from enriched faction asteroids (which contain Enriched Clear Icicle, Smooth Glacial Mass, Thick Blue Ice, or Pristine White Glaze) works the same way as regular faction asteroids, but contain more of the same materials. These asteroids are only found in nullsec (in systems controlled by their respective factions), or in the Shattered Ice Fields of Shattered wormhole systems.
The ice from standard asteroids (which contain Glare Crust, Dark Glitter, Gelidus, and Krystallos) contains large quantities of Heavy Water, Liquid Ozone and Strontium Clathrates, but no faction isotopes. These asteroids are only found in low-sec and nullsec, or in the Shattered Ice Fields of Shattered wormhole systems.
Rats will spawn randomly while you are mining ice. There is no mechanic at this time that will cause the spawns to stop after a certain number have spawned.
Compression: can be obtained from Upwell structures with active Standup Reprocessing Facilities, Orca, and Rorqual
Respawn Rate: 4-6 hours (debate on how long) after the last rock is completely mined out. This field will not repopulate or refresh until completely mined

Moon Ore Mining (Moon Goo)

Moon mining can take place only at refineries and fitted with a Standup Moon Drill I service module, which appears on the outside of the structure as a giant laser turret aimed at the moon. The Moon Drill is then used to extract a chunk of the moon for mining. After extraction, the mining is performed using the same mining equipment and processes described in Asteroid Mining.

There are 5 classes of moon ore; Ubiquitous (R4) Moon Ore Yield, Common (R8) Moon Ore Yield, Uncommon (R16) Moon Ore Yield, Rare (R32) Moon Ore Yield, Exceptional (R64) Moon Ore Yield. Each moon will have a different combination of the types of ore it will yield when mined. Moons are classified by the highest "R" value ore it yields.
Rats will spawn randomly while you are mining moon ore. There is no mechanic at this time that will cause the spawns to stop after a certain number have spawned.
Compression: can be obtained from Orca, and Rorqual
Respawn Rate: Completely dependent on the settings of the mining drill

Pochven

Pochven systems also spawn ore deposits periodically through the systems. These ore anomalies can be mined for Bezdnacine, Talassonite, Rakovene and Spodumain. The value of the ores depends on where the deposits are located; border systems have the lowest quality, internal systems have moderate quality, and home systems have the best quality ores. Home systems also have a chance of spawning Mercoxit as part of their ore deposits.

IMPORTANT NOTE FOR MINERS: Roaming fleets of EDENCOM, Triglavian, Rogue Drone, Sleeper and Drifter ships can warp to these sites. If one does not have neutral/positive standings with the rats, immediately warp out unless you are confident that you can take on them.

There are 3 types of sites; Border, Internal, and Home. The name is based off of where in P-Space the site is located and what type of ore is available to be mined.
Asteroid belts do not spawn in Pochven systems.
Ubiquitous Mineral Fields that can spawn in system, which can be mined for reaction materials like Neodymium.
Ice belts will still spawn if the system was doing so before it became P-Space, but the rate will we lower than before the transformation.
Compression: can be obtained from Porpoise, Orca, and Rorqual. However due to the mechanics of getting ships into P-Space, the Porpoise is considered the best ship for this.
Respawn Rates:
- Observatory Flashpoint sites in Pochven, and Accelerator Flashpoint sites in EDENCOM fortress systems. They will now respawn immediately after being completed.

Specific Mining Ships

Venture, the Tech I mining frigate
Expedition Frigates, Tech II mining frigates
- Prospect, an expedition frigate specialized in gas cloud harvesting
- Endurance, an expedition frigate specialized in ice harvesting
Mining Barges, Tech I cruiser-size ships specialized in resource gathering
- Procurer, a mining barge with strong defensive capabilities
- Covetor, a mining barge with high mining yield
- Retriever, a mining barge with a large mining hold
Exhumers, Tech II mining barges
- Skiff, an exhumer with above-average defensive capabilities
- Hulk, an exhumer with very high mining yield
- Mackinaw, an exhumer with a very large mining hold
Porpoise, an industrial command ship that is small and maneuverable
Orca, DO NOT USE IN NULSEC It does not tank well enough and moves too slow to compensate, an industrial command ship with several large transport bays
Rorqual, the capital industrial ship

Mining Skills

Basic skills

These skills are the bread and butter of any miner and should be trained up to level IV reasonably quickly (primarily for the increased mining yield, but Mining IV in particular is a prerequisite to many other mining-related skills). However, note that these skills only increase the yield for ore mining!

Mining: +5% ore mining yield per level.
Astrogeology: +5% ore mining yield per level; requires Mining IV.

Specialty Mining Skills

These skills are only relevant if you want to expand from basic ore mining to Mercoxit, ice, or gas cloud harvesting.

Ice Harvesting: Required for Ice Mining. 5% reduction in cycle time per level.
Gas Cloud Harvesting: Required for Gas cloud harvesting. Allows use of one gas cloud harvester per level. With 100% more mined at Level V
Deep Core Mining: Required for mining Mercoxit

Upgrade module skills

As mining lasers and mining upgrades are CPU-hungry, training CPU Management will make it easier to fit your ship.

Mining Upgrades: Required for fitting and using Mining Upgrades. Requires Mining III.

Drone skills

Mining ships use drones both for defense and increased mining yield. The Drones skill is the foundation skill and should be eventually trained up to V (once you start flying Exhumers it's highly recommended, and valuable even before). To use drones defensively, train up Light Drone Operation, whilst mining drones need Mining Drone Operation. Drone Interfacing is somewhat of a long train, but even getting it to level IV makes a big difference in how effective your drones are. Advanced Drone Avionics is only needed if you plan to use ECM drones, and the drone specialization skills are needed when you start using Tech II drones. For more details on how drones work, see drones.

Drones: Increases number of drones in space by 1 per level, for a maximum of five drones in space at level V.
Drone Interfacing: Increases drone damage and mining drone yield by 10% per level. Requires Drones V.
Mining Drone Operation: Increases mining drone yield by 5% per level. Requires Drones I.
Mining Drone Specialization: Further increases mining drone yield by 2% per skill level and unlocks T2 mining drones.

Spaceship Command Skills

In addition to letting you fly the mentioned ships (which only needs level I), training higher ranks of these skills greatly enhance their respective ships. For instance, the Venture gains +5% mining yield per level of the Mining Frigate skill - which is on top of the bonuses provided by Mining and Astrogeology!

Mining Frigate: Needed for the Venture.
- Expedition Frigates: Needed for the T2 hulls Prospect and Endurance.
Mining Barge: Needed for the Procurer, Retriever, and Covetor.
- Exhumers: Needed for the T2 hulls Skiff, Mackinaw, and Hulk.
Industrial Command Ships: Needed for the Porpoise and Orca.
Capital Industrial Ships: Needed for the Rorqual.

Fleet Support skills

These skills are needed for flying Porpoise, Orca (just don't fly it) and Rorquals

Leadership, Wing Command, and Fleet Command: Increases Command Burst area of effect.
Mining Foreman: Increases duration of Mining Foreman Command Bursts. Requires Leadership I.
Mining Director: Increases the strength of Mining Foreman Command Bursts. Requires Mining Foreman V.
Command Burst Specialist: Reduces reload time for Command Burst modules. Requires Leadership V.

Asteroid Ore Reprocessing Skills

These skills are important if you wish to reprocess your own ores, and they unlock access to mining crystals which massively boost mining yield when fitted to appropriate mining harvester modules.

Simple Ore Processing: +2% per skill level to veldspar, scordite, pyroxeres & plagioclase reprocessing yield.
Coherent Ore Processing: +2% per skill level to omber, kernite, jaspet, hemorphite & hedbergite reprocessing yield.
Variegated Ore Processing: +2% per skill level to gneiss, dark ochre & crokite reprocessing yield.
Complex Ore Processing: +2% per skill level to bistot, arkonor & spodumain reprocessing yield.
Mercoxit Ore Processing: +2% per skill level to mercoxit reprocessing yield.
Abyssal Ore Processing: +2% per skill level to bezdnacine, rakovene & talassonite reprocessing yield.

Moon ore Reprocessing Skills