Self Defense and the Bounties are still good!
21 Feb 2016ED_Recluse
Found and accepted two missions to find Osmium from the BB, so there I was trying to eke out a miner's living in the Asteroid Belts. I kept getting interdicted and harassed by would-be pirates. Discretion was the better part and I ran like hell from a Vulture, but the Eagle, Viper, Sidewinder and Imperial Courier that thought they would be preying on a defenseless miner got the business end of 2 Beam Lasers. They didn't quite have the firepower or skills and I was quite grumpy at being disturbed!All was well that ended well (FOR ME). Sourced the Osmium, found good Bulletin Board payouts for some remaining Painite and Platinum and got good prices for the Silver, Palladium and assorted other minerals. The bounties didn't hurt the bottom line either.
Of course this could all turn on a decicredit some day, but for now life is good.
My mining Cobra actually has pretty much the same firepower now that the Cobra I used for Bounty Hunting before moving up to a Vulture had, so I feel pretty safe out there. Still going to run like hell from the big nasty ships, but it keeps the Bounty Hunting skills sharp to get into the occasional dogfight out there among the asteroids.