Excavator Decay, Skills, Eco Considerations

I hear it all the time... How it's cheaper and less decay to use TT excavators or whatever. Well, it's a double edge sword.

Do you want to be as cheap as possible pulling your claim out of the ground but give up skill gains? Or do you want your skills to add up faster?

I have had 3400, and 3500 ped claims... Both times I used the skill calculator at Entropiedia to see how much TT my skill was before drilling the claim, and then I checked to see what it was after. I tracked my decay from drilling too. Using the RE-104, both times, I had slightly more TT in skills (Engineering, Mining in the case of my caldorite, and drilling in the case of my oil, Computer, and serendipity I believe also increases during drilling), than the decay spent on the extraction of the claims.

I know, you can spend peds but you can't spend skills... Sure... But, skills are important. It's just we don't know exactly how or in what proportions, or even why. All I know is as my skills go up, the quality of ores and enmatters I find goes up on average, and my average claim sizes go up too over time. Therefore, either it is ped turnover, or it is skill gain, or a combination of both, that lift your loot caps.

Do you want more skill? Do you want more play time? Or do you want to pinch every pec you can even if it means slower skilling? Play style impacts what you get out of the game... If a person has all the answers, they will do better than someone who has none of the answers... That said, no, I don't have all the answers. It seems like as soon as we make ends meet, MA moves the ends. However, I will note, the particular research I have done and the results I have found, are holding true. Yes, high variance, but over time, I am heading upwards a bit and I am hoping to survive long enough to hit that big tower.