A New Venture
02 Nov 2020Gehanii
The last couple of years have been relatively good to me. I’ve been able to build a sizable fleet of highly specialized ships for various purposes—no more hot-swapping modules! I’ve participated in a number of different activities over time, helping in various systems when the whim struck me, sailing out into the black for some peace of mind, dabbling at AXI efforts in the WHN. The introduction of personal carriers a while back greatly intrigued me but the cost & upkeep were daunting.I wavered back-n-forth, periodically engaging in some heavy-duty mining. A recent crazy for low-temperature diamonds prompted me to try it; I’ve almost always mining high-value metals. I found the icy asteroids unpleasant and the effort tedious. So back to my platinum-palladium-osmium mining. Until I heard from a distant acquaintance about dedicated painite mining. I’ve encountered the stuff over the years and have always been excited to have a unit or two to sell at markets, but I never considered dedicating myself to just painite. I questioned the value of it: after all, I’ve never found it in sufficient quantities to justify the focus. My “friend” then let slip a poorly hidden secret location where painite all but falls into a miner’s cargo scoop. I’d not heard of the place before, but I never considered it as an option either.
For an initial cut of the profits—finder’s fee, my “friend” called it—I set out to explore this magical system. I found the planet in question & my scanners showed that the ring belts were indeed rich with painite. I scouted several nearby inhabited systems for a base camp, initially settling on Jitabed before moving closer at Gurabru.
I dusted off The Paragon Prospector & upgraded her mining gear and took her in. Within an hour, I had a hold full of painite! I had no idea what to do! The Prospector didn’t have the range to reach any lucrative markets, so I spent an exorbitant amount to have The Welkin Wyrm transported over to the station. Transferring the cargo to the Wyrm was easily accomplished and she was a formidable combat presence, so pirates shouldn’t be much of a worry. The profit at the end of the lengthy journey was unlike anything I’d seen before! With some dedicated effort, I could afford a carrier after all!
But I wanted to expand the return rates and wasn’t convinced that the Prospector/Wyrm were the best for the work. Nothing else in my little flotilla would suffice either, so I needed to purchase some new vessels. I debated between a pair of Cutters and an Anaconda/Cutter. I settled on the Anaconda/Cutter as I thought I could outfit the ‘Conda for wildcat mining once all was said & done. (In retrospect, that turned out to be not the greatest idea after all, but 20-20 hindsight & all…)
The ‘Conda—The Empyrean Wildcat—was initially fitted with a fuel-scoop & FSD booster. Once the painite mining began in earnest, I wound up swapping in another cargo rack for the fuel scoop and another collector LC for the FSD booster. In this final configuration (and longer really being applicably named), she was able to cart out 320 units of painite per trip. Depending on the vagaries of the Gods of Luck & Space, this could take anywhere from 2-3 hours.
The new Cutter—The Auðhumbla—could carry 440 units of cargo, was equipped with a massive fuel scoop and FSD booster, and a suite of defensive mine-launchers to deter pirates. I would try to make up the difference in cargo capacities but not always was able to find a good value.
The new ships performed admirably & after several months of on-again/off-again efforts, I found myself in range of being able to afford a personal carrier. Then doubts settled again. They were expensive, upkeep would be a constant worry, was there really that much value to having one, etc.? I convinced myself that owning one would indeed to be more trouble than it would be worth. I parked the mining duo, booted up The Fernweh Starfarer and set out for the black. At a minuscule outpost on the edge of the bubble, having a last meal & drink in civilization (if this speck of metal could be called that) before my trip out, I overheard a couple of veteran pilots arguing about the merits of owning a carrier.
Unabashedly eavesdropping, the proponent claimed it was like having a mobile station for all of her ships and equipment. Her opponent conceded the argument at the point, referencing the costs of shipping her dedicated bounty-hunting ship to various flare-ups in the bubble. That sparked a bit of an itch in my mind… I had dabbled in a number of various ventures over the last couple of years, several of which required some retooling of one ship or another.
I pulled up my inventory and looked it over. I had over 80 pieces of gear scattered across 2 dozen different stations! More than 60 of those pieces were fully Engineered to boot (which is why they weren’t sold when they weren’t needed any more.) Furthermore, out of my roughly dozen ships, they were docked at six different stations, 2 in the WHN!
I looked up receipts for ship & equipment transfers: a lot of credits bled out there. Digging deeper, I pulled up flight logs from various missions where a refit was necessary. The travel time to acquire the new modules plus the effort to Engineer them was staggering! Twice as much time was spent on the refit than on the actual missions!
Well, that convinced me: I not only could make use of a personal carrier, but I all but needed one! So, back I went to acquire the credits to close the purchase gap as well as fund the carrier’s upkeep for the next few months. Spending 5.5+ billion credits with one click was a bit nerve-wracking, but now I’m the proud owner of The Empyrean Empress. (After naming the carrier, I’ve decided I need to rename the mining ‘Conda…)
The carrier’s first few days were spent gathering together my wildly scattered fleet & modules from the bubble. Then acquiring sufficient fuel to travel to the WHN and collect the ships & modules stored there. Now that that’s been done and everything is under one roof, so to speak, I have the enviable task of considering what to do next… I think I will need a mining Cutter after all, for the tritium to fuel the carrier. I can then refit the Wildcat back to being a capable wildcat mining ship. Then I’m thinking of either heading off to the mining enclave I encountered deisul from the bubble (not the Omega Mining Group, who are hubwise from the bubble; this group is rimwise.) Then some deep-range exploration I think, maybe check out Campbell’s Carbon Star & keep on that-a-way…