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Friday, September 30, 2011

Mining: Ore Finders Vs. Average Search Depth for CALYPSO ORES

I just compared the average depths as logged by www.mininglog.com... This is data taken from their members mining results, and they average it out... And I know that it is possible to be mining past the depth for certain ores and enmatters, so it pays to pick the one finder that can find what you are looking for and try to keep from going past the depth too far that it is usually found at. Sure, you may still hit it at a much deeper depth, but it could just be a fluke, the system correcting for your losses for example.

As I understand it though, the higher the level the finder is, the more shallow of deposits will turn up. The lower the finder, the closer your finds will be to the average depth. So if you are using a Tk or VRX, I wouldn't worry much about this, and if you are using those then you already know what you are doing!

F-105 Untiered (Avg Depth 522m)

Alferix ~569
Belkar ~507
Blausariam ~514
Caldorite ~553
Cobalt ~484 (Perhaps a F-104 work best for Cobalt, but I hit it good with the 105)
Copper ~586
Erdorium ~614 (Untiered E Mine should work great here)
Frigulite ~549
Gazzurdite ~574
Ignisium ~604 (Untiered E Mine should work great too)
Iron ~568
Lysterium ~519
Narcanisum ~550
Niksarium ~572
Zinc ~592
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

E-Mine (No Depth Enhancer) (Average 676m)

Adomasite ~677
Dianum ~598
Durulium ~651
Erdorium (See under 105)
Eironite ~697
Himi ~652
Ignisium ~604
Kanerium ~641
Megan ~666
Quantium ~624
Zinc (See under 105)
--------------------------------------------

E-Mine +Tier 1 Depth (Average 727m)

Azzurdite ~716m
Petonium ~700
Pyrite ~ 745

--------------------------------------------

E-Mine + Tiers 1-3 Depth (Average 827m)
(Another tier of depth might not hurt for some of these deeper ones)

Ganganite ~845
Gold ~ 821
Iolite ~828
Kirtz ~ 935
Langotz ~ 831
Maganite ~ 827
Morpheus ~ 996
Platinum ~ 904
Redulite ~ 1042
Ruga ~ 839
Tridenite ~ 874
Terrudite ~ 870
Valurite ~ 913
Versperdite ~ 1006
Xeremite ~ 892
Zanderium ~ 932
---------------------------------------

Coming up on the next post: The same chart for Calypso EXCEPT I will do a list of enmatters!

After that, I plan to do lists with all other planets ores and enmatters for your convenience.

This list took quite a while to research and break down, I hope you find it useful, and if you know anyone else that can, feel free to givem a link!

Utilities: Mining Claim Logger / Depth Charts / General Ore Locations

Well... Information is crucial to success for the prospector. And with the ever changing updates, Finally we have a reliably updated list of depths, min, average, and max that are derived from over 100,000 claims from nearly 200 users.

http://www.mininglog.com/ appears to be an awesome utility and the stats are priceless!

Now, you can pick an area, and target the average depths of everything you want to find by either tiering with depth enhancers or using different finders!

I have yet to download the utility and try it, but it's 30 + megs, and I am on dialup so it's not happening any time soon LOL.

You do have to register with the site, but it is worth it in my opinion because the data gathered and compiled is indeed priceless beyond measure. Even if the depths change, the changes will be reflected in the statistics. It is a dynamic way of assembling such an amazing collection of information!

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Mining: Why I Think It Has Best Chance Of Globalling

Anyone really serious about wanting to get globals and hofs I think is best to stick to mining. Learn all you can about it. Always used a maxed finder and don't fall for that SIB crap. I have always skilled faster on a finder that's already maxed.

See... Hunting seems to require a HUGE amount of peds to be cycled before you can even think of a global. For instance... I have killed many thousands of mobs since starting 4 years ago. Only global I got was two years ago on a Drone Generation 1. I had hunted so much that both my Laser and BLP are nearly 3K, my rifle is around 3K... Seriously, that's a lot of peds spent hunting. Then I decided to start being serious about the Argo challenge. I got a global half way through my 1K mission. That means, it took me about 600 to 700 kills to even global, not counting what I blew killing other mobs. I spent nearly two full days hunting drones and minerbots. Since my global, I have killed over 1000 more argo with no global. I seriously doubt a hof is possible hunting. Check my entropia tracker page and have a good laugh. Seriously. Goldbaron Goldbaron357 Maximus.

Crafting tends to require high QR blueprints. If you are of moderate or low skill, you don't have a snowballs chance in hell of a global or a hof unless it is an expensive item to craft. And then its only because you lost so many peds you globalled. I am not knocking crafting, but its not something where you can do say, 5K clicks and guarantee a global.

Prospecting on the other hand... I will say surveying too, but in general the surveying claims are much smaller than an ore claim, because surveying costs half as much per drop to do... However, it is great to skill up your geology first before moving onto ores if you so choose, but now, with being able to mine for both at once, I'd say do both at once from the very start, that way your prospect and survey should remain about equal, and I highly suspect it is a hidden amping effect if you hit one and not the other.

But as long as you have sufficient number of bombs to drop... I would recommend at least 100 bombs to drop (That's 100 peds worth if ore, or 150 peds if both), but the more the better, and if one area not doing good, go to another area and increase the distance between drops. You will find a lot of times you can hit good size claims if you are down a bit and balance back out. Markup on ores is a huge deal, because most hunting loot is TT food, I mean, sure, you might get 100.1% on oils, but unless you sell directly to a crafter, you can't afford to pay auction fees to fill orders on some of that junk.

You are able to cycle a greater number of peds faster, with better average returns so long as you are wise about where you are searching and what finders you are using. I wouldn't worry about amps until you get a feel for where things are found, and what is a good reliable area for your skillset and equipment. Then after you find an area you are getting a good hit rate in, maybe consider amping... But I recommend one level of amp for every 10 levels of skill for best return. It would seem if you reach past this rule, returns will often jump off a cliff. I speak from many thousands of lost peds from doing so.

A global is 50 peds. You are dropping 1/50th a global when looking for ore. Most times you get a great return if not a profit. If you keep cycling your peds, you should quite easily find a global within a day or two of solid mining. I have hunted for 18 hours a day several days straight and not hit even one global. I have crafted a lot of clicks on things i used to global and hof a lot on, and nada. But mining, I was able to hit 5 globals in two days recently.

My mentor always said if you want to global or hof, MINE. Now I know why after 4 years of playing Entropia.

Speaking of mentoring, if MA finally does actually come out with the updates that are supposed to happen, and they do eventually bring back mentoring, I will be happy to take on some disciples and teach everything I know about mining and crafting. Just leave a comment here or email g o l d b a r o n 3 5 7 at g m a i l . c o m, just remove the spaces.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Arkadia: Crafting Contest, and Treasure Coming Soon Hopefully

It would appear that there is currently a crafting contest going on at Arkadia, crafting globals on arkadian blueprints over 100 peds are eligible for one of a series of blueprints. I don't know what kind of prints, but I would assume that they are primarily going to be issued to the winners of the competition. I havn't had a crafting global in so long I am probably not even going to bother!!! But those of you who think you have what it takes might look into it further and give it a shot.

Yes, the auction house is a bit volatile... The crafters aren't around because it's hard for them to procure enough resources to craft with, and without crafters, there is no market for the miners to sell to. Me being on Arkadia right now trying to mine, I end up TTing all my ores becuase I can't wait a week for all my peds worth of stuff to sell. So most of what I have lost up there is due to the fact I can't get markup since there isn't a lot of demand because there isn't a lot of supply.. It is really a vicious cycle.

HOWEVER... All you gotta do is place your orders up there. Most resources HAVE no orders. If you give orders, you will get miners wanting to sell their resources now. And traders, traders of all people should be jumping on this opportunity.

My biggest complaint is there is very little narc, alice, and iron to be found on Ark.. It's not a bad thing to have common stuff on other planets be rare here and vice versa... It creates opportunity, but what we need are people to jump on that opportunity. I would do it myself, and maybe I will... But I am so short on funds at present that I can't even begin to try.

SO with all of that said.. I take that back, that is not my biggest complaint. My biggest complaint is we've been waiting so long for treasure hunting to get here that I hope it is actually going to be in this next update. I can't imagine how much business Arkadia is losing because of this not having been released on time.

Those of you who have suggestions, you need to make sure and let support know what your suggestions are. You might think they don't listen to what you have to say, but if you send them reasonable ideas that are plausible and even beneficial, they do listen. I see many things that I and others have suggested come into play finally. The squeaky wheel gets the grease and the customer is always right... Unless Mindark is wrong, in which case they won't admit it :P That's why if you ever have a support case, MAKE SURE TO SEND THEM A SCREENSHOT OR THEY WILL DENY ANYTHING WENT WRONG!

I will be on Arkadia for quite a while maybe, and any crafters needing materials, feel free to get ahold of me and I can arrange to meet with you to supply you with anything you are needing for crafting. Otherwise, place orders on the auction house and I will look for them and fill them as I always do.

Question of the Day:
If you spend say 300 Peds on an amp or something and use it up, do you think of it as a loss of $30, or do you just think of it as a loss of 300 Peds?

You might ask what importance this has to me, but it does have some. There is a psychological element to the Entropia Universe... Personally, I tend to think of it in terms of Peds.. Spending $30 in a casino and losing it is far more devestating to me than losing 300 Peds in Entropia, but why? Just wondering if it is similar to you guys is all.

I do not believe Entropia Universe is a casino... In fact, to avoid that legality, everything is "skill based", and "skill based" gaming is not gambling... Though you are still risking a stake to try and win a profit... Just a thought... And I highly suspect the reason banks are in fact pawnshops in the game, is because for them to actually allow actual bank type banks, being a real cash economy, it would violate a ton of banking regulations around the world... Just my observations, maybe I am wrong...

Part of what I am trying to do here is to get you guys thinking. If you aren't thinking about things, then your mind becomes dull, and if we keep it sharp, your losses will be much less. If you don't use it, you lose it.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

ENTROPIA ABACUS: Trading Utility I Just Released Today!

I am somewhat of a C++ hobbyist... I am learning a great deal about programming with C++ and PHP... But I have traded a lot in the past and with people coming up to me asking if they could buy 10 peds of lysterium or 20 peds of gazzurdite, I wanted to be able to QUICKLY figure out how many ingots I can give them for the amount they have to spend and still ensure I can make a slight profit at least. When I can resell directly, I don't try to charge as much as I can. You can make nice profits and not be greedy at the same time.

An Abacus is an ancient calculator that is by our standards, unusual. My utilities that I am creating do calculations that are unusual as well. Who ever heard of a ped to quantity calculator? :-)

Eventually I will make the interfaces fancier and more modern... I will add more capabilities... I want to corner the market on helping my fellow entropians any way that I can.

I know it is very basic right now, but give it time. I am constantly working on projects, new and old, to see what I can do. You shouldn't have any problem running it in Windows 7, Vista, or XP.

The home page is located HERE. You may download the program for free, and while it is free, you may donate, any amount will help fund my current projects and allow me to bring you higher quality tools. As a bonus, your contribution will allow you to advertise one of your links on my site, that will be placed along side your name and the amount you contributed. Only first names will be posted, as a thank you. This will all go on it's own page soon as I finish building a proper site.

If you haven't checked it out yet, please visit http://abacus.horizon-host.com!

What Survivability Means

I have spent the past 8 years or more of my life playing and learning all I could about Video Poker. There is not a whole lot Entropia has in common with Video Poker. But there is one thing of great importance which I've hinted about in my earlier posts. Survivability.

Every statistical action in the world has results that are never predictable with 100% accuracy. In some cases, we know the mathematical probabilities that govern certain outcomes, and can thereby know our odds and if the risk is worth it. In Video Poker, I can tell you that a jacks or better paytable showing 9for1 on full house and 6for1 on flushes will return 99.5% over the long run, IF PLAYED PROPERLY. This is where the professional is able to actually make a profit where the casual players don't care or don't know, and lose a lot more.

If you play video poker properly, you can survive the cold cycles long enough to see it warm back up and start paying good again. If you miss a few proper plays, it can cost you a few hands on the end of your session. Those very few hands can make or break your entire session.

Entropia, there is no way to tell you the long term payback. Only Mindark knows this, and only they know how it is calculated (it's probably better that way LOL)... First lesson is though... Say you put $10 in a nickel machine and play 1000 hands. That's 5,000 nickels you wagered. You only got 4,800 nickels back. So even though you lost 100% of your bankroll, you got a 96% return. See, people fail to realize that those credits you are recycling ARE part of your return.

In Entropia, if you want to know your % return, you are going to have to track everything you spend on Decay, Ammo, etc, and track every pec you get back in loot. You might be doing extremely well but you won't realize it becuase losing a few percent at a time even, will grind a small bankroll into oblivion in no time.

If you have a large pile of peds, you will do much better. It will be much harder to go completely broke, and it will give you less volatility so that you may survive to see a hof that will greatly correct your losses. On a small pile of peds, you have a much greater chance of going bankrupt before you even see a global.

Too many times I am guilty of being a cheapskate, putting in $20, and losing it in a few days, and then i'll put in another $30, and then maybe a couple more deposits after that. What I should have done was just put my $100 in and not worry about it. At least by the time you cycle a full 1000 peds, you should have most of it back in loot by the time you reach the end of the run.

But you have to discipline yourself not to waste, not to lose faith in the law of large numbers. I had about 30 NRF's in a row on TI north recently, and it corrected with an XI. But what happens if you run out of bombs without hitting anything, but had you kept going, the correction would have been a XV, or a XX?

Three times I have had my very last hand in Video Poker result in Straight Flushes for 250 credits or Four of a Kinds worth anywhere from 125 to 800 credits depending on the variations im playing.Yes, it is a long shot to say my last bomb is going to save my run. Yes it is a long shot to say my last hand will be a Royal Flush. But the longer you can play, the better the odds of it being possible.

I hope this helps some of you better understand what a great return really means and why getting a great return can still mean you lose.That is why getting the most markup you can out of your resources is paramount to anything else. This is what bridges the gap between a 96% payback and a 101% return.

Friday, September 23, 2011

50 Posts and over 50 Hits a day! Thanks To My Readers!

Thanks everyone for making this blog more successful than I could ever have imagined! I don't have any intentions of letting this blog fall by the wayside. As often as I can find new content to blog about, I will post it here.

We have surpassed 50 hits a day!

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Need Peds? A Few Links To Earn A Few Bucks

This is going to be an entry that will be expanded and reduced as time goes by. I know a lot of us need more peds but don't have the money to deposit. There are a few programs which I am aware of that HAVE paid me in the past. Earnings is slow, and not large sums of money, but it is still more than what you are likely going to make from sweating. The goal here, is to show you ways of earning an extra $5, $10, or maybe even $20 a month that you can deposit in Entropia if you like. You don't have to use it for that, but maybe you want to get back some of the money you have been depositing.

I promise this is going to be the only post in this blog dealing with this topic. After much debate with myself, I decided it was acceptable to share anything I know of that will help my fellow Entropians. And since money is what drives Entropia, I didn't think it fair of me not to share some good streams of small but regular income. Some of them don't need much or any effort at all, others will require quite a bit of effort to get much out of them. But it is less tedious than sweating if you ask me!!!

None of the following are affiliate with Entropia or Mindark in any way. Also, I am not affiliated with these outfits either, other than I am a member with them and since I have made some extra cash that I was able to deposit into EU with, I wanted to bring them to your attention. I will not ever post a link to any program that does not pay or otherwise is a scam. This list will be added to regularly so bookmark this post and check back from time to time for any new links.

I can't tell you you will make a certain amount, it all depends on you and how much effort you put into these. But I do know if you put as much effort into them as many people put into sweating, you can easily make more than you would sweating! Just be aware though that there are at times cashout minimums, and they can take anywhere from days to weeks to months to hit... But it is nice when you finally get your payment!

Little Effort Required:
-------------------------------

MyFreeShares... I have been a member with them for many years, and they have been good about making their payouts. You earn shares through various methods, and these shares earn you a portion of the site's revenues. The more shares you accumulate the more you will earn. But they started deducting shares when you make a withdrawal, but this ensures everyone gets a fair chance to make a decent amount right from the start, as opposed to "having to catch up" with the people with the most shares to get anything.  It is very very slow earnings, but steady and almost no effort required. They can pay you with PayPal.



Lots Of Effort Required:
-------------------------------

Exodus3000:
It takes a bit of time to really get going on this one, you get 250 moves a day, but there are ways to earn more too. You mine for resources which fluxuate in value, and you earn Mars Dollars, which convert into real money when you get enough to convert them. Depending on your levels, as little as 300,000 Mars Dollars will equal $20... But starting out, it takes 1 million MD to equal $20. They post their exchange rates for each range of skills.  You can attack other player's and take some of their money, and they can attack you too if they find you. It is quite a bit of fun but can get tedious and as such isn't for everyone. It is a browser based game requiring java. It's an option to being bored if you end up waiting for all your peds to sell on auction house :-)


MORE COMING SOON!!!

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Yes, Mind Ark Really Does Payout!

Over the years I have heard a lot of people say that Mind Ark is under no obligation to honor your withdrawal requests, and that given the chance they will simply not pay out. However, if you live in certain countries, or your gameplay is questionable, that may be true. I am aware that there have been some people successfully exploiting Entropia Universe. Fortunately a lot of that was put to an end. But I will leave that for another post some day.

I know several friends, in real life even, that I have seen their bank statement proving that YES, MindArk DOES honor their withdrawal requests. But on another side note...  It took one of my friends 3 months to get his cashout. I largely suspect that the processing times will vary greatly and for unknown reasons. You can speculate MindArk is drawing interest off of your money before paying you out. Others suspect they pay off the top of future deposits. I don't believe either is very accurate to say, although what business is not leveraging every dollar they have so that they have more padding if they fall on hard times.

This is a very important topic I wanted to comment on because there is a lot of unconfident people out there and yes it would suck to trade for hours every day for years and then find out they won't give you a dime. But put your worries to rest. If you are doing anything that violates their terms and licensing agreements, then you shouldn't expect your withdrawals to be honored becuase you don't deserve them to be.

When someone exploits a bug or a glitch in the system, they are getting the rewards but not paying the price, thus taking away from everyone else that is spending and working hard trying to get what some people have managed to get through glitches. If you are aware of someone exploiting a bug or a glitch, please do the right thing and notify MindArk immediately, it protects the virtual real cash economy from being artificially drained leaving everyone broke.

As for scammers, do not lend stuff without taking collateral worth equal or greater than the item being lent UNLESS it is a friend in real life and you know where they live if they don't give you your stuff back :-) Use common sense people. No matter how pitiful the plea for borrowing an item is. There are maybe three people in the whole Entropia Universe that I would lend to without collateral.

But bottom line is, people are successfully cashing out thousands of dollars at a time without any problem other than long delays reported in getting their money. But if you get to where you are cashing out once a month, even if it takes three months to get your first one, when you stop cashing out you still have a few months of deposits coming :-)

So, have a good time, good luck, and go get your hofs!

Mining Amps: The New Changes Explained

I was stunned to do the math and research to find out that a Level 3 Finder Amplifier is now equivalent to an OA102. However, it would seem that because it charges the same decay for enmatters, that it is equivalent to an MA103 in that regard.

The eMine amps have maintained their effectiveness. However, if you look at the item info on an eMine I vs. eMine II, you get the best bang for your buck with the I.  Notice the efficiency is 3.8, and the II is 7. This means for half the cost you are getting a little more than half the performance.

It is important to always consider all economic sides of every tool, attachment, or item you otherwise use in Entropia. A lot of you may only lose 10 peds per hunt, or 20 peds. But when you go through and fine tune your economy side of hunting, you can find that those 10 and 20 ped losses would have been avoided by being as efficient as you can.

Mining is the same way. However, to be successful at mining, you have to eliminate volatility. A run of say 500 drops will be less volatile than a run of 100 drops. A longer run gives you more chances for any losses to balance out and maybe hit a big hof or a tower. I would find it hard to believe anyone could run more than a 1000 bombs and not global or hof, but not that it hasn't happened.

I am not positive why it made sense to go to 13 levels of amp, and I am not even positive why they would make the decay the same for ores as enmatters, but you should notice significantly larger than average claims while just surveying.

Personally I find the new system confusing, but am getting used to it now that I understand what the changes are. Also it makes room for more crafting opportunities and allows more control over how much amping you want to do.

Good luck and happy mining!

Monday, September 19, 2011

UPDATE: What You Should Know About Interplanetary Travel

The Universe has grown a LOT in the last year with the advent of Arkadia, Rocktropia, and Next Island and it's associated areas that serve to add onto the Entropia Universe. However, some urgently important issues need to be stressed now that the travel has changed so much with the creation of interactive space.

The grass can certainly be greener on the otherside. I had planned to take my 500 ped mining run to F.O.M.A. (Which I still try to refer to as CND, just because I have tons more respect for Neverdie than I do for Foma, and to me it was always CND, and probably always will be, so forgive me if I use CND interchangeably with F.O.M.A.) which I decided not to and stayed on Calypso because there is no one way teleport from the asteroid to Calypso any more. Which means...

You either have to find a trader that will take the risk to buy your ores, and because they are risking getting looted by pirates in space, they will probably pay you smaller amounts than trader or auction on Calypso will.  Or, you trade terminal your ores if they are under a certain markup. Not very pleasant situation.

It is important to note that everyone going into space, everything on your materials tab and resources tab, generally speaking, can be looted if you are killed in space by pirates. Your best bet, is to try to book passage on a mothership. Your next best bet, is to find someone with a craft fast enough to outrun most pirates, but it will probably cost you.

I have heard especially after the last update, the pirate activity has picked up immensely in space. So best bet, A. Dont take anything valuable with you that can be looted. B. Go with someone extremely well armed, and worst case hopefully you can defeat the pirates.

I connect to EU on dialup. My lag isn't bad much at all normally. But in space, I can't run the risk. I would get killed before I could even try to defend myself. So make sure you have a fast connection if you attempt to fly yourself. If someone else flying you, don't worry about it, it in their hands.

If you must travel and try to haul your cargo, take the most indirect routes to your destination as possible. I can't be any more specific than this or I risk letting everyone know the strategy I use to stay safe. But even if you dont have anything to lose from being looted, you still will lose TT value on your vehicle from taking damage from another player in PVP.

Plan ahead, talk to people who frequently travel through space, get every possible bit of advice you can... And you should do fine. Good luck, and I wish everyone an ATH, becuase if I can't get one, you guys might as well!

How To: Increasing Your Damage Skill Without Chipping In

Weapons technology seems to be one of the dominant skills that influence your damage abilities. Anatomy also affects your damage abilities too. But I have a bit of a problem with my skills. I have only ever used Laser or BLP, no melee and not a whole lot of explosive weaponry. So... My damage skills are 5 levels apart from hit skills in Laser, and 2 levels apart in BLP. It seems odd to have such a large gap...

But I used to hunt things I could kill without needing to fap. And not fapping means I am not gaining Anatomy. And not gaining Anatomy means my Damage skills are hurting. But if you don't want to be a medic or waste fap trying to skill up, then there is one more option.

If you are wanting to use Laser, craft some laser weapons such as the Jester D-1... You should be able to get a high QR blueprint from auction for around 50 to 80 peds usually, but only consider paying this amount if the QR is over 75 and there is no cheaper deal available. It makes a big difference in your crafting losses to have a high QR blueprint, trust me. D-1's are cheap to craft, only needing two Iron, Two Belkar, and One Melchi.

If you need to increase your BLP damage, craft some BLP weapons.

That's really the only ways I know of getting damage skill up. But Anatomy is decently cheap to chip if you decide to go that route.

Hope someone out there finds this useful.. I just post things I learn as I learn them and if I think someone else out there can use the info. Thanks for reading my blog, and check my other topics for anything you might have missed or needed to know!

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Mining Research: Mine for Ores, or Enmatters, or Both at once???

It would seem that the more confusing MindArk makes elements of the Entropia Universe, the more money people will lose before they figure out what they are doing wrong. This was almost me being the victim again. Fortunately, I have been able to reproduce my results. Not saying it's going to be 100% right. Fact is, you could be most opposite of my conclusion and still manage, in even a small remote possibility, of hitting two towers on one drop. That doesn't prove I am wrong, that only proves you are lucky to the tune of one in many billions. There is always room for an exception to occur. But let's make luck the rule rather than the exception, shall we?

By stretching your ped roll as long as possible, you give yourself more chances at hitting a home run. If you spend wrecklessly, you actually get fewer chances at a jackpot. What we are all about here is the law of large numbers. The more you do something, the more likely you will succeed. Many times playing Video Poker, I have literally hit a straight flush or four of a kind on my last 25 cents. If I would have missed one proper play. If I would have accidentally thrown out a pair of jacks or kings, I would not have had the stake to make the last bet that ended up winning me enough to keep playing and come home a winner. It is the same way here. If you spend wrecklessly, you may go broke before your jacpot comes along. That is why what I am telling you here is important.

So...

Yesterday's test involved a Finder 105, two Level 2 Finder Amplifier, two Level 3 Finder Amplifier... And a few hundred peds in probes. I spent most of it mining in the same general region.

For the first three amps, I burned up a level 2 light searching for both ores and enmatters. That was something like 100 peds or so spent, my return was eh, 70 peds with markup. Not tooooo bad, but my average finds were level III and IV. It just didnt seem like I was getting anywhere.

I went on to a Level 3 amp. I probably recovered 25 or 30 peds on that one, again doing both.

I did my last level 2 light, and again right around 50% return. Mining for both.

I realized some things of importance. First, by bombing for both, if you don't increase your mining run to account for the extra cost in mining for both, you are actually cutting your possibilities of hitting a hof or a global. By mining for both, you are dropping 1/3rd less bombs total. That is 33% less possibilities at hitting something big.

Second, I realized that my Prospecting is level 23, and Surveying is around level 17 or so. It made me realize that there is such a large gap that my surveying skills would be giving me less of a return than my prospecting skills, lowering my average return. To this time, I was still only pulling average of V's, thats even with a Level 3 amp too.

So I decided ok. I am going to burn the entire last amp just mining Ores. It will give me more drops, and more chances to get some peds back. Also, my prospecting skill gave me confidence, it's one of my highest skill sets, if not the highest.

I started hitting VIII's all over the place. Almost every bomb hit. Gazzurdite, Cobalt, Durulium... Azzurdite... 10 points extra credit if you can identify where I was mining just by those resources :) Towards half way through, I hit a 155 Cobalt I think it was. I didnt mine it right away, figuring if I am on a warm cycle, I will keep mining. I only extracted my smaller claims. Then, I hit a 65 ped Durulium I think it was. Two globals on one amp... I dont usually do that, but considering the heavy losses I suffered the previous three amps maybe the servers were balancing out my losses for me... BUT... Fact is...

1. Average claim size went up a great deal.
2. By sticking to my highest skill, I got the best return.

I speculate that if your Surveying and Prospecting are more closely matched then you should comfortably be able to mine for both, though I recommend any time you mine for both, you want to extend your budget by 33% to give you the same chances of hitting something good accross the board.

So out of 500 peds, I came out with around 600 to 700.

Now today, I am again mining just ores. I have hit a 50 ped blausariam... My initial finds were far and few between, but I ended up with a 40 ped gain after running through half a 102, not light that is.  So 150 ped run yielded 190 with markup. I am now off to finish my other half of the run and see if my findings still hold true!

Good luck and happy mining!

______________________________________

UPDATE!!!
--------------------------------------------------------

I just concluded the second half of my run.

Another global on Cobalt of 68 peds I think, and a level XII gazzurdite one or two stones away from a global.  I ended the second half of my run which cost around 150 peds (Whole level 2 run takes around 300 peds without markup), second half ended at about 200 peds. A rough gain of about 50 peds.

The whole time I was mining in one region. I haven't moved areas all day. I want to do another amped run and see if I can work up into a hof, but I gotta get my nerves to calm down first! I need my peds to keep going up because there's so much I want to do. But mining is my strongest profession. Crafting used to be, but I chipped up my prospecting and I think that pushed my tendency to be a good miner even higher. Still I have never had a hof over three digits. And that was 908 I think gazzurdite with a OF 105 and a OA102 (which if you want to convert into the new amp system, a 103 is equivalent to an OA102), second biggest hof was crafting at around 500 and some I think it was. I have yet to hof on hunting, but I am still working at it!

I think whatever you do the most is going to be your best profession. Although I do a lot of hunting and crafting, my avatar STILL wants to be a miner!

Standard Damper and Basic Filter Crafting: YES THEY GLOBAL

I know the first stop in skilling in crafting is filters and dampers. I know of no actual use in the game for the filters other than to be TT food. Dampers, I really have never seen anything that needs them, but maybe I am wrong as people seem to buy them.

What is nice about crafting them is, you can deposit $10, and 100 peds will buy you a LOT of Lysterium and Oil. TT cost per click for filters is 5 pecs, 7 pecs for dampers. In small lots you should be able to get oil and list for about 110% markup or so. In 100 peds, you should get 1800 clicks or so with markup. Now, with the autoclick feature at the terminal, all you have to do is set it and forget it. Don't worry about your first hundred or two clicks. They may be doing great, they may be doing horrible. But over 1800 clicks, your run will balance out. That is why you get 300 residue drops or maybe some K's of residue...

I ONLY recommend doing this if you have decent skill and decent QR... But if you want a global faster and don't care about smaller amounts of loot, slide the slider to condition. More filters and dampers will drop on a success. More residue too. In fact, your residue tends to be worth about 109% on orders in auction because it is used by limited item crafters. They can take 50 peds of residue at 110%, add it to a 300% markup craft, and essentially are making triple their initial investment back on that residue. Now how many clicks they may have lost to get a success cuts into their profit margin.

If you start with a 1QR blueprint... I will advise you that on full quantity (It just means a higher number of your clicks will succeed, versus a lower number of higher value successes on condition), I can honestly say that you can expect a global around 75 to 85 QR. You should be able to hof after you hit 100 QR and keep going for some time.

Also, STAY AWAY FROM S.I.B. anything.. Skill increase bonus is just a marketing gimmick. A fully skilled tool, weapon, or blueprint will give you more skills than one that you aren't maxed out on.

Do not recycle any of your materials until you are done with your run, and then start again. If you keep rolling what you got back over, it will generally balance out, and you shouldnt suffer any real big losses. I played for 6 months on my first 100 ped deposit, and I was mining, crafting, hunting, you name it.

Just be aware there is a lot you will want to do but not have the skill to do. Be patient, if you don't it going to cost you a LOT in the long run.

Good luck and go get your globals!

Oh, and you can check what items have globalled and what their record highs are for loot on www.entropiatracker.com.  It will also track your globals too!

Saturday, September 17, 2011

HOW TO: How to Fill or Place Auction House Orders

I still run into people who have been on Entropia for years that have never learned how the Auction house works... They have not yet used the orders for ordering materials or selling resources. So, I thought it would be appropriate to give everyone a quick tutorial on how the Auction house ordering system works.

PLACING ORDERS:

Rules:
You can only place orders for UNLIMITED items.

When you place an order for an item, the FULL TT + Markup is held by the system until order fills. 

If the condition of the item is less than full TT, You receive a refund for the difference in condition when the order is filled.

As of last time I've used the orders, it cost 1 Ped per day that your order runs. If it is a rare item, you need to run for more days sometimes to get it filled. If it is ores or other resources, one day is plenty because if someone raises their orders too high over yours, yours may never get filled unless the market drops.

What it is useful for: Ordering crafting supplies for much lower than you can buy them off auction directly. Obtaining expensive items that you don't want to pay full retail for but reasonably think someone would sell to you at a lower price such as a hard to sell item but they need the PEDs.

How To

In the auction house, there are two tabs at top. One says Offers, the other says Orders. Offers is what everyone is trying to sell. It is where you go to buy things directly off auction, or just list things for sale. You need to click on the Orders tab.

At the bottom of the window I believe it has a button that says either Make Order or Place Order. Click it.

Select your item from the list that you wish to order. It can range from blueprints, to animal oils, to metal ingots or raw resources. Even weapons! But note they are all unlimited. Limited items must be bought and sold at the prevailing market price as dictated by supply and demand.

Once your item is selected, you decide how long you want the order to run. If you are ordering common items such as ores and enmatters, you will want to note the highest order price already listed and the quantity they ordered. The highest order price will get filled first if the quantity the seller sells is equal to or smaller than the ordered amount.

Say there are two orders for Narcanisum.

Order 1    1000 Narcanisum at 140.50%
Order 2     2000 Narcanisum at 139.19%

Scenario 1: If you sell 1500 Narcanisum for 140.50%, it wont fill the order, and will go straight to auction for buyout at the price you chose. You can instead sell it to order 2 for 139.19% or as close as you can get to it, because they have enough quantity ordered.

Scenario 2: You have 500 Narcanisum to sell. Even if you sell it at 139%, it will still go to order number 1 because they have the highest bid, and they have enough quantity left to buy your lot.

FILLING ORDERS:

Rules: See scenario 1 and 2 from last section.

How To:

What I recommend doing is just type in the item you have to sell in the search and click on the orders tab. If any orders show up, those are what people are offering for you to sell them the item and how many they still want. The advantage over auction is, you don't have the risk in worrying if it will sell or not and whether or not you will lose your auction fee if it doesn't sell.

When you find an order you want to fill, you must go to the offers tab. Sell item like usual, except you only put in up to the quantity of item ordered, and you set the buy out price AT OR BELOW the ordered markup. If both of these conditions are true, the transaction will be instantly completed and the PEDs available on your card right away!

That's all there is to it!

It is not uncommon to save 10 to 20% in material costs by placing orders instead of buying straight off the auction. This is a huge benefit to crafters, and it helps other crafters and miners by giving them instant demand if they need to use the peds they just tied up to keep playing. It sucks to have all your peds in auction house waiting for things to sell.

Good luck and may everyone ATH or have fun trying!

Simplified Crafting Advice: General guidelines that help with returns.

Crafting may seem complicated and more like a slot machine. In a sense it is, but in a sense no. See... You can eliminate some of the slot machine traits by crafting items with enough markup that even if you lose a few clicks you can still break even or profit with the markup.

However, there are a great many questions about what is best to set the slider to on the crafting machine. After much thorough thought, and some experimenting today with crafting, I have came to the following solution:

IF 100QR and you have the skills needed!

Short run: Best to either do full quantity and use residue if L items, Or set the slider to just where Green turns to Yellow.

Medium run: Recommend setting to the bottom of the green. It will give you a little bit better chance at big drops without giving you too many no drops.

Long run: If you want to go for a jackpot on a cheap item, Full Condition wont hurt you if you have a couple thousand clicks to do, in fact, you might be surprised!

IF 50 to 75 QR

Keep the slider in the green if you can. Once you are over 75 or 80 you can comfortably increase condition without worrying too much on longer runs.

If under 50...

Then I recommend keeping it in full quantity.

UNLESS!!! You are an uber crafter starting with a fresh blueprint in which case your skills will greatly help offset the cost in levelling up a new blueprint. If you are crafting level V components with no problem, I wouldn't worry about doing full condition on a 1QR print of a lower level, just go ahead and do it if you have the peds and want to do it.

Also...

If you aren't getting good results in one area, change to another outpost or tp. It's like mining: You can't hit what isn't there!

Friday, September 16, 2011

Update On The Economy in Entropia: Major Price Changes Open Up Opportunity

Because I am dedicated to the crafter and miner, though more and more I am hunter friendly, the prices in the market place and auction house affect us all. When Thrusters first came out, they were around 500 peds with markup! A great many were sold and used at those astronomical prices! Gungnirs were 1500 peds without any weapons when they came out!

Well... In the past month or two, prices have changed a LOT.

ON CALYPSO:
Thrusters are going for about 30 to 50 peds now, so what, about 700% markup instead of the 7000% they used to be!

Gungnirs and Sleipnirs are going for 300% or so now. So you can pick one up for about 75 Peds.

However, on Arkadia, thrusters were selling for around 80 peds, meaning there is room to make some money if you want to make the long flight.

Alicenies is rockbottom at very nearly TT food prices. However, it still selling for a nice premium on Arkadia and who knows where all else. This is one resource that might be worth just buying a bunch to wait for prices to go back up. It is used in so many blueprints, and for high demand components like Basic Sheet Metal.

Narcanisum is cheap now as well, at around 125%.

The time hasn't been better for buying things, in general, prices on most things have dropped, so nows the time to hit the market and auction and see if you can turn a buck!

And no, this isn't a promotion for Mind Ark LMAO... Instead, this is your wakeup call. The early bird gets the worm... And the first man gets the oyster and the pearl, the second one the shell! Go show the world what Free Enterprise can do for you! Where there is opportunity, there are profits!

My Hunting Experiment: Why I am succeeding now, and wasn't before.

It has been a while since I have posted in my blog here. I regret the delay in bringing you new information. But I have been doing some research this whole time and thought it would be worthwhile to blog about. There really are no trade secrets here, since you can apply this to your favorite mob, and see how it works out for you.

Out of 300 ped budget...

OLD METHOD:
Buy 50 peds of ammo, 100 peds bombs, 50 peds on repair and maybe another 100 peds on L gun or amps for mining finder.

I'd get maybe a 25% return on my hunting loot and maybe a 50 to 80% return on my mining.

NEW METHOD:
Buy a few hundred peds of ammo. DO NOT SELL ANY LOOT until you have used up all your ammo. I found that there was less wasted and loss peds by holding onto my loot until the very end. You can still mine and craft if you want to. But keep your mining and crafting supplies and budget separate from your hunting.

What you will find is, your chances at globals are much higher... I had not globalled since 2 years ago while hunting. That was my first global which took me 2 years of hunting to get that! Well, my friend explained his method, and that's what I been doing ever since, and after one 200 ped hunt and six 100 ped hunts, I am only down maybe 10 or 20 peds from 300. 100 of that was used to buy an economic L gun and UL amp. The 200 ped hunt lost 100 peds. No surprise there. So I repaired and rearmed. 100 ped hunts then on out.

Well, by the fourth trip or so, I got my 72 ped global. A ton of mini globals, that being anything large but under 50 peds. By the end of that trip, I was back to my original 300 peds.

I had to upgrade some of my armor... NOTE TO NOOBS: DO NOT USE KOBOLD FOR ANYTHING EXCEPT FEFFOIDS. IT IS EXTREMELY BAD TO USE FOR ARGOS! You want Ghost or Shogun instead! 5B plates for most mobs and 6A's for Drones.

But now after every 100 ped hunt, I am having a few more peds than repair costs. So bigger runs mean a bigger chance to get something good.

Bottom line is, you can't just hunt with a few peds and expect to get good loot. You either do really really well on a short hunt, or VERY VERY BAD. It takes time and sheer number of kills for it to balance out.

So I don't recommend hunting with less than 300 peds for ammo after you bought all your weapons and other gear. And then don't recycle it as you go because then it is so much easier to waste it. Wait til you are all done and you will find that you can keep paying for run after run after run!