Trading Performance: Ammo
Posted: 2013-01-29 Filed under: eveonline, industry, market | Tags: antimatter, barrage, caldari navy, fusion, hail, multifrequency, phased plasma, quake, republic fleet, scorch 2 CommentsOverview
I’ve stated in a few monthly or end of year reports that I’ve had limited success with ammo. I made some database queries and went over my historical trading data to evaluate ammo trading performance.
Market Group Stats
45.481 M units sold, profit of 2.382 B, and average profit/unit of 16,556 ISK.
Analysis
From this analysis you can see that working with Faction ammo and certain Tech 2 ammo types are the most profitable. I’ve highlighted the ones that I would continue to work in a blueish shade.
Large-scale Nullsec Industry
Posted: 2013-01-16 Filed under: industry, nullsec, ships | Tags: 6VDT-H, fountain, ogaria, solitude 4 CommentsOverview
Nullsec industry does exist, but not as you would expect. There are significant more logistical hurdles involved, which makes it a strange incarnation when compared to industry in the contiguous Highsec world.
While reading over the CSM7 Winter 2012 Summit Minutes, I felt the desire to expose my method of industry to help the CSM and CCP better understand how large-scale people are working with the current design of Nullsec.
For reference the Nullsec industry discussion that sparked this post starts on page 45, second to last paragraph of the CSM Minutes.
Heavy Experience
I’ve built over 663 Battleships, 1,270 Battlecruisers, and 32 Carriers.
Since I hold a disdain for the UI involved in the Invention process, I’ve done limited amounts of Tech2 Invention. This means that I have purchased my items mainly in bulk from manufactures. My report shows that I have moved around 28,000 modules.
The amount of ISK I’ve touched is quite amazing, coming in at 836 B ISK.
In CCP’s new terminology I’m called an enabler.
Seagull: Enablers are the people who make the logistics for these large-scale things actually work. They are people who run mad spreadsheets to organize production lines for war efforts… … – Page 5 of the CSM Minutes
All my efforts are to supply hordes of nullsec warriors with tools to win battles — to make sure that our troops on deployment have Autocannons and Hulls that can fit the doctrine.
Methodology
Here are my C-level objectives to keep in mind as I outline my process for building in Nullsec:
- Minimize risk by securing assets.
- Minimize time sinks so that I make more for less play time.
- Maximize market velocity so the ISK flows.
Efficient Logistics
Wait, people mine in Nullsec!? Yes, over the past three years of building I have found small niche groups that do mine locally in null. I’ve even developed a few agreements to source discounted materials in bulk when available.
I don’t want to disprove that people mine and do Tech1/2 industry in sovereign nullsec stations, but rather to show that there are paths of least resistance to getting better [faster] results.
Despite local groups mining, sourcing your materials in from Highsec is far more efficient that waiting for miners to produce results while periodically dodging AFK neutrals. Buy in bulk in Highsec, compressing, jump in, uncompress, and building is quick. Elise (@EliseRandolph) clearly understands this process as noted on page 45 in the fourth paragraph of the CSM Minutes.
Bringing in assets from Highsec reduces my timesink as I can buy in bulk from a large pool of suppliers.
The POS System
This may be a scary point to accept, but the easiest solution to making sure your industrial assets are secure is to not use the POS system.
With a deployed asset out in space, you are vulnerable to attack. Your ships, minerals, and datacores can all be locked if the tower is put into reinforced. Rather than use a user-deployed structure, I have opted to use NPC pockets withing large alliances or a Lowsec system that is within close jump range to the alliance main staging system. Additionally I detest the process of fueling, deploying, anchoring, and onlining structures so I have gravitated away from the POS system.
Not using a POS in space allows me to secure my assets inside a NPC station. There is no risk of my assets being locked in a station when sovereignty flips. For me, there is no clear need for an industrialist to setup a POS network, maintain fuel, and defend assets when there are logistically easy options available.
Side conversation: I’ve heard so many ramblings about reducing jump range to combat this logistical option. If jump ranges are reduced, I will create another cyno alt and place him in-line of my path efficiently making the range adjustment pointless. Two jumps now rather than one? Bleh.
System Selection
Large hubs are not hard to find in Nullsec. If you go to Dotlan, select a region, and filter by jumps over 24 hours, you can easily see where the traffic is located.
For TEST’s old capital region of Fountain, you can clearly see that 6VDT-H is the focal point of traffic. The main system of 6VDT is in within one jump of Ogaria, a factory system in Solitude. Here you can peacefully uncompress minerals, construct, and have easy access to Solitude research slots in a Highsec island.
Selecting a place with a large amount of Nullsec people enables you to have high market velocity so that you can transform your goods back into ISK, which can then go right back into your construction projects. Money makes money.
So, Game Mechanics
I don’t claim to be a game designer so I can’t offer a 1-2-3 punch-list of what to change in order to reach an ideal state of Nullsec industry. What I want to show is that given the current system, one person has the ability to produce large amounts of change on the industry landscape in Nullsec without the need for any locally sourced goods.
My sentiments for Nullsec industry change are very basic. There needs to be a reason for an enabler like me to setup shop locally. Conversely there needs to be a reason for the instigators to defend what I have build.
Visualization of Technetium and Cobalt Moon Concentrations
Posted: 2013-01-10 Filed under: eveonline, industry, market, nullsec | Tags: cobalt, technetium, the citadel, the forge 8 CommentsOverview
We always hear that “Technetium is concentrated in the North”. I wanted to use data that I have to visually show this concentration to further prove that claim. Additionally I want to show how different the concentrations of Cobalt is when compared to Technetium. Cobalt is of particular interest as it became a recent star due to changes in alchemy in order to impact the rising cost of Technetium.
The Data
I have been developing a database of moons and their associated minerals. This dataset was born out of frustration when I used to help my corporation perform reactions in the Pure Blind and Cloud Ring regions. Often our logistics crew was doing double survey work so I started a centralized point of information to hold our moon data.
My coverage is small and has many inaccuracies; I have coverage on 32,000 moons at this point, which only covers 22.31% of Eve’s 143,402 Lowsec and Nullsec moons. I’m sure that there are some gross errors as I have pieced this data from various public and private sources. Alliances and reaction-heavy Corporations tend to guard their moon data very closely, so I’ve have limited exposure to verified and sanitized data.
Moon Coverage
My coverage of Technetium is 275 moons with an estimated 360-450 in existence. Using a conservative guess of around 400, that give me an estimated 68% coverage with a large amount of error.
The dataset on Cobalt is higher, coming in at 2,702 moons. I don’t have an estimation on how many there are in existence, so I can’t judge my coverage.
Despite the inaccuracies of my dataset, it can still be used to produce a scatter plot of the Eve Universe. I’ve added The Forge and The Citadel for map orientation purposes.
[Jan 10 Update]
From the comments so far, a lot of people are having trouble with the scatter plot. It is a 2D map of the Eve Unvierse with dots for systems that contain that moon type or are of that region. I thought that adding The Citadel and The Forge would help clarify the orientation of the map. Keep the Verite Influence map in mind when looking at these plots.
Technetium
Cobalt
Carrier Runs 1-22
Posted: 2013-01-06 Filed under: eveonline, industry, market | Tags: archon, chimera, nidhoggur, thanatos 3 CommentsOverview
The fruits of our trading operation have seen the growth of a Heavy Industry branch of our operation. The initial ISK outlay to start the operation was high, but our market research proved the venture to be viable.
The Numbers
We have been running for around 25 days and we have sold 22 hulls. So far we have been very pleased with the results and velocity of sales. As expected the Nidhoggur has a smaller margin and velocity when compared to the other racial types.
Heavy Industry
We have reached a point where we can keep all 7 Carrier BPOs in production. Our mineral sourcing, compression, and transport operation has been moving materials along with ease.
An industry goal for 2013 is to expand into Dreadnought production. We have purchased the Capital Component and Weapon Blueprints. Once they reach acceptable ME/PE levels, we’ll start to produce Dreadnoughts.
2012 Trading and Industry Report
Posted: 2012-12-21 Filed under: eveonline, industry, market, ships | Tags: archon, charon, chimera, deadspace, faction, ishtar, maelstrom, nidhoggur, obelisk, oracle, procurer, retriever, rokh, sabre, scimitar, talos, thanatos, tornado, vagabond, zealot 6 CommentsOverview
Another year of growth and transitions into larger projects.
Module, gun, ship construction and trading proceeded as it did the previous year. With reliable income from trading, we expanded our operation into heavy construction by adding a Carrier construction wing to our operation.
From these numbers we can see that our operation is facing more competition as margins were slightly lower than the previous year. To overcome this, we migrated our inventory to higher per-sale profit items. The drastic change in quantity can be explained by dropping Ammo as a common trade item.
This overview shows the benefits of spreading your trade load between high ticket, low volume items and more volume centered low price items.
Quick Numbers
Q1 and Q2 saw renewed vigor into trading as I started to invest more time into logistics and product research.
Q3, July especially, was a record breaking time as I took any liquidity and moved it back into assets. This also marked our shift into high ticket items. Additionally, at this point in the year my trading partner and I had a lot of time to devote to our operation.
September into October is a busy time for me personally. I took a long vacation October and was away from Eve for a few weeks. Everyone needs a break and our performance numbers directly show this.
Highlights
Procurer speculation with the Inferno Patch.
Outsourcing some Highsec logistics with Red Frog Freight during busy periods.
Expanded trading into High Meta items.
Expanded construction and sales into Carrier hulls.
Invested 133 days of training into Racial Cruiser Construction V and Jury Rigging V to enable Tech 3 hull and subsystem production in the coming year.
Invention
Though there are profits in invention, I found the process of gathering materials, inventing a BPC, putting the component parts together to be uninspired; I had no real focus this year with invention. Most of the time I spent in this area was spent making Drones and increasing my stock of -1/-1 Anshar prints for a rainy day.
My two invention characters have 4-4-4 skills. I have found the training return of getting 5-4-4 or even 5-5-5 skills to marginally increase profits. Since the train time to get a Science skill to 5 is around 20 days, I have not felt the need to sink time into polishing off the skills.
I did keep a database record in order to produced the below summary of my invention statistics The overall success average came out to be 48.2%, which falls in line with any invention guide.
High Meta
With the addition of Faction, Deadspace, and Officer modules to the market, I saw several trading opportunities throughout the year to work with these items. I had little to no interest in using the tedious contract system to trade these items so when they were added to the general market, I rejoiced.
Here is a summary of the performance of items by Meta levels. Faction and Deadspace items traded well and brought consistent high profits.
Escalation Barge Teiricide
With the changes to mining barges in the Escalation patch, my partner and I mainly targeted the Procurer hull as its build requirements changed the most with the patch. We speculated that the new barges would cost more post-patch so we build a large stock before patch day.
We ended up selling 288 units for a profit of 2.48 B. We put a smaller amount of effort into Retriever hulls and managed to build and sell 44 for a profit of 431 M.
Fear the Sabre
I had limited success with trading other racial Interdictors. The Sabre is the champion of them all and hopefully we see some further balancing to these hulls in upcoming patches.
Alpha Maelstrom to Rail Rokh
This year we saw the popularity of the Alpha Maelstrom as a viable Nullsec fleet composition fade away in favor of the Rail Rokh. I was slow to react to this change and by the time I got my Rohk BPO researched to an acceptable level, the switch to the new doctrine was already underway.
Rigs and Guns
The core rig types (Trimark, CCC, and Field Extender) continued to be a solid performer. If you sell a ship in an area, you should also sell related rigs to popular fits. Let this be a lesson in item cross-selling for anyone building, stocking, and selling ship hulls.
The core gun types seen below also provided some income over the year.
GoonSwarm Shrugged, I Smiled
During the GoonSwarm Ice Interdiction, I speculated on POS fuel and turned a profit. I made 648 M doing some passive trading in Jita on Oxygen Isotopes. In addition, people started to panic and predict that other Isotopes were going to be affected also. I made some early buys on Nitrogen and then sold them off at the height of their price level.
High Meta
I have focused on and found a number of High Meta items that have proven to be very profitable. I’ve blanked out the names of them because I don’t yet want to disclose the item types at this point in time.
Implants
As expected implants were a high performer.
Standard Modules
High volume modules provide a small source of income as working with these items means you are in a competitive and often saturated market.
The new Drone Damage Amplifier modules sold very well, but I had poor success with the Reactive Armor Hardener.
Batch Ammo
I have continued to have limited success with ammo. I have found the velocity of trading to be very slow which I think is due to the nature of ammo production and consumption.
Since ammo jobs are batch based (meaning that when someone runs a production job they are producing a large bath of ammo rather than a single unit), production has periods of high volume. Additionally when someone buys ammo, that person tends to buy a large stock and slowly work though the pile.
I keep stocking ammo with the intention that it will move, but I always am unimpressed by the numbers.
Tier 3 Battlecruisers
The popularity of the Tier 3 BCs remains high as I was able to make a profit on every racial type of them. Surprisingly the Oracle and Talos have been outselling the Tornado.
HAC Favoritism
The Cerberus has remained a poor performer with no production or trading opportunities arsing this year. The Ishtar remains a strong seller as a preferred AFK mission ship while the Vagabond holds up the PVP end of the HAC spectrum. I fully agree with Kirith Kodachi’s recent comments on the upcoming rebalance initiative that will eventually hit HACs.
Tech 2 Logistics Falling From Grace
With the recent rebalance of Tech 1 logistics, I expect my production and trade of Tech 2 logistics ships to decline. As Jester pointed out, the proficiency of the Tech 1 variant can cheaply replicate the Tech 2 variant.
Future Ventures
Champion CREST API changes and development with the community to enable 3rd party tools to flourish.
Pressure the CSM for industry and mining changes.
Though the Carrier project is new, it is proving to be profitable so we expect the expand the operation. We are going to look into Dreadnought production in addition to carriers.
Build from stockpile of Tech 3 hulls and subsystem BPCs.
Build backlog of invented Anashar BPCs.
k162space 
