Score!

I scored another great deal on a buy order today.

Easy money. A nice big profit and a quick one too considering I only put the buy order up a day or two ago.

Core X-Type MWDs normally go for 450 - 500 mil on Jita and I've sold some in other regions for 600-700 million. So I can get ~450 mil for a quick  ~430 mil profit if I flip it on Jita or if I'm willing to be patient (and I am) I can make 500+ mil.

Not bad for a 20 mil investment.

Bot or Not

Going through my log today I found someone had sold 8 individual Caldari Navy Missile Launchers to me. The interesting part was they were sold individually, one at a time, yet all 8 were sold at the exact same time.

It's also noteworthy that a similarly named character (same last name, different first name) had purchased 6 from me 4 days earlier for just over 9 million more per launcher. Assuming that's another alt of the same player it would seem he or his bot isn't smart enough to sell things for more than he paid for them.

Note the time-stamp in the log, it's exactly the same for all of them. That's 8 individual sell orders he entered, all in less than 1 second (somehow I missed one line while cropping the screen capture). And no I didn't post individual buy orders myself either, they were all sold to the same order.

So the question I put to you is this: Bot or not?

Market Cycles and PLEX purchases

As traders we notice many different market cycles. Being aware of cycles and adapting market strategy to take advantage of different cycles can increase profits greatly. Some of the different cycles commonly seen in online games include daily, weekly, monthly, holiday, seasonal, patch and expansion cycles.

One thing that always puzzled me in Eve because I couldn't figure out what was behind it was an odd monthly cycle.  I noticed that I always seem to make more profits (both larger margins and higher overall profits) during the first and last weeks of each month. It always seems like the competition gets fiercer, margins tighter and sales harder to come by during the middle 2 weeks of every month.

In fact I often felt like I was just spinning my wheels during the middle two weeks and not making very much no matter how much time I spent working the market.

Conversely it often seems like I make half my profits in the first week of the month.

Last month to test that and make sure I wasn't just imagining things I hardly did anything during the middle 2 weeks of the month. I still made over 34 billion. Roughly 20 billion in the first week, 10 billion in the last week and only about 4 billion the 2 weeks in between.

For the longest time I couldn't figure out what could possibly be behind this strange market behavior. Then suddenly it hit me.

Real Life pay cycles and PLEX purchases must be behind it. A lot of working people get paid around the end of the month. Players are more likely to pay for their gaming habits when they have the most money and for most people that's around the end of the month. They buy PLEX from CCP with real money, sell the PLEX for ISK and use the ISK to purchase in game items. That drives market sales volume up for a while. The lowest priced sell orders and highest priced buy orders get filled quickly which in turn increases profit margins.

Furthermore, higher prices encourage faction grinders, mission / incursion runners, manufacturers, etc., to cash out therefore increasing sales competition and bringing prices back down again.

Finally it makes sense!

Warp Speed and Acceleration

We knew changes were coming to warp speed and warp acceleration in Rubicon but we didn't have any details until recently.

Here's a link to CCP Fozzie's official post with details on the warp changes

I like it! A lot!

Here's the meat of Fozzie's post, links to charts showing how long warps of different distances will take before and after the changes.

How long it takes for different ships to make warps of different lengths now.
And how long it'll take with the current design for Rubicon.

Note, "current design" obviously implies it's still subject to change.

I believe these changes are going to be a good thing, it all seems to be extremely well thought out and perfectly balanced to me. Of course with all the Blockade Runner pilots I have I particularly like how it's going to affect them. Blockade Runners are already one of the fastest warping ships but they're going to get a whole lot faster in Rubicon. In fact Blockade Runners (along with Interdictors) will have the second best warp times of any ships in the game (only Interceptors and Covert Ops will warp faster).

These changes are going to be awesome, they get a big thumbs up from me!

Something for market speculators to keep an eye on, with these changes Gravitational Capacitors may become a more popular choice on T3 cruisers. If so they'll almost certainly go up in price.

Then again, maybe not. I'll almost certainly still prefer the lower alignment times I get with Intercalated Nanofibers, Interdiction Nullifiers are pretty much a must have for many pilots in null and the normal space speed bonus from Fuel Catalysts is really nice for AB fits too.

It'll be interesting to see how much of an affect Hyperspatial Velocity Optimizers will have on the new warp times too. Currently a pair of them increases warp speed on a Prowler from 9 to 13 AU per second or nearly 45%. For T1 ships with 3 of them fit it's closer to 70%. That might be an even better item for speculators to watch.

Training Report - October 2013

Training report for 02 Oct 2013

First some numbers:

12 Accounts
23 Characters

21 Traders (17 finished training trade skills, 4 in various stages of training)
18 (out of 23 total) Empire regions covered by traders

5 Covert Ops pilots
6 Blockade Runner pilots (7 more coming in under 3 weeks)
2 Tengu pilots
1 Recon pilot
1 Rattlesnake pilot
23 Vigil pilots =)

16 PLEX/mo (4 accounts dual training)

I work a mix of regional and station trading with a fair bit of hauling and courier contracts between regions. I've dropped nearly everything worth under 5 million and most under 10 million on all but one of my traders though there are a few cheap items I still buy on some characters (mostly high volume items I use myself).

I train my traders for 305 orders with the following trade skills: Trade V, Retail V, Wholesale V, Tycoon V, Accounting V, Broker Relations V, Margin Trading V, Daytrading V, Marketing V, Procurement IV, Visibility IV and Contracting IV. I consider them to be "finished" training trade skills at that point.

Some traders in smaller regions stop training Daytrading and Marketing at IV instead of V since that's all they need to cover the entire region (in fact a few of the smallest regions can be fully covered with III).

I'm cutting back on the number of accounts dual training (for a while I had 9 dual training) while slowly building up wallet balances and escrow cash on the newest traders.

Account 1

dual training active

Essence (Renyn) Regional Trader - Fully trained trader, blockade runner pilot. Not currently training.

Tash-Murkon (TM Prime) Regional Trader - Fully trained trader, currently training blockade runners.

Verge Vendor (Alentene) Regional Trader - Nearly finished training trade skills. Just needs to finish up Marketing, Daytrading, Procurement and Visibility. Currently training Marketing V.

Future plans: Finish training trade skills on Allentene, then remap Int/Mem and train Blockade Runners + support skills on Allentene too. Keep dual training active another month to finish training blockade runners + support skills on Tash-Murkon.

Account 2

The traders of Amarr, Dodixie and Rens. All characters on this account are finished training trade skills. Two are Covert Ops pilots, all three are Blockade Runner Pilots.

Amarr Station Trader - 305 orders (maxed),  Currently not training.

Dodixie Station Trader - 305 orders (maxed). Cov Ops pilot.

Rens Station Trader - 305 orders (maxed). Cov Ops pilot. Currently training Int/Mem support skills.

Future plans: Remain in the Int/Mem remap and continue training support skills on all 3 characters. In particular, Navigation, Engineering and Shield skills. Maybe train one into Industry eventually.

Account 3

Lonetrek Regional Trader - Finished training Trade skills. Covert Ops and Blockade runner pilot. Not currently training.

Jita Station Trader #2 -  Finished training skills. Does nothing but trade officer/deadspace/faction mods. Not currently training.

New Trader - Brand new trader, just started training less than a week ago. Has trained basic nav/shield/fitting skills and remapped Char/Mem. Currently training basic trade skills.

Future plans: Continue training trade skills on the new trader for the next 3 months. Once she has at least Margin Trading V, Accounting V and Wholesale IV pick a home for her and start actually trading.

Account 4

Jita Station Trader #1 - Finished training trade skills. Does nothing but station trade skill-books. This is the only character that still deals in very many items in the 1-10 million ISK range. Not currently training.

Exploration / Scout / Scanning pilot - Flies Covert Ops (Buzzard), Recon (Falcon), Tengu and is training Int/Mem support/scanning/exploration skills. Has Astrometrics V, all the rest of the astrometrics skills at IV and most shield, navigation, fitting, EW and exploration skills at IV or V. I don't plan on doing any serious trading on this character. He has 29 order slots, more than enough to buy things he needs and that's it. Currently training Jump Drive Operation V. It's a long ways off yet but eventually he'll fly Black Ops.

Future plans: Continue training Int/Mem skills on the exploration/scout/scanning character. Long term this character will eventually remap Per/Wil to train Black Ops battleships and Missile skills. Will probably eventually start a new character on this account too.

Account 5

Dual training active

My Main - Covert Ops, Tengu, Rattlesnake pilot with all racial Battlecruiser and Destroyer skills at V. All by himself on his own account and concentrating mainly on Per/Wil combat skills, with particular focus on missile skills (nearly 10 mil SP in missiles now). 125 orders, Wholesale IV, Accounting IV, Broker Relations IV, Margin Trading IV and all of the "remote order" trade skills at IV. He hasn't been involved much in trade for some time now.

Currently training Combat Drone Operation V

Orvolle Trader - Relatively new trader, not doing a whole lot yet. Currently training Wholesale V.

Future plans: My main is finally nearly finished training Missile skills now (almost 10 million SP in missiles). He can use T2 Heavy, Cruise and Torpedo launchers. I hate flying slow ships so battleships are low priority for me but Rattlesnakes interest me and I'll probably eventually get Black Ops. I might go for Recon Cruisers, HACs, Interdictors and HICs too. He'll be staying in the Per/Wil remap for a long time yet and will probably get a bunch of Gunnery skills to IV or V too. The new trader has another couple months of trade skills training to go and will likely train blockade runners after trade skills are done.

Account 6

Hek Station Trader - Finished training Trade skills. Covert Ops and Blockade Runner pilot. Not currently training.

Jita trader #4 - Almost finished training Trade skills. Handles the Jita implants market and dabbles a little in other markets. Currently training Marketing V.

Future plans: Finish training Marketing V and Daytrading V on Jita. Then start up a new trader up on this account.

Accounts 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

Six accounts I started just before the news about dual training broke. They're all traders following the same training plan with the first two a day ahead of the next two and the last two roughly a week behind that.

Five of them started out as secondary traders handling lower priced items in 5 different regions but I gave up on that plan (it was just too much work for the returns involved) and moved them all to new regions. It's far less work now and the returns are much better too.

All six are finished training trade skills, have remapped Int/Mem and are training for Blockade runners now. They'll all be able to fly Blockade Runners in 3 weeks or less. Once they can fly Blockade Runners they'll each spend another 2-3 weeks training Navigation, Engineering and Shield skills up to where I want them at.

In addition I've activated dual training on two of these accounts and started up yet another two new traders. As the original characters finish training Blockade Runners + support skills I'll start up new characters on the other 4 accounts too.

Hi Sec POCOs - Dead On Arrival

There are hi sec Player Owned Customs Offices coming in Rubicon but it's not quite as simple as it sounds. It seems the special snowflakes in low and null need advantages, or more particularly additional limitations and restrictions on hi sec POCOs to remain competitive.

"The NPC tax will continue for hi sec POCOs (as we want low sec POCOs to still be competitive). The tax rate stays the same, at 10% for export and 5% for import. This is then in addition to whatever tax the player owner sets." - CCP SoniClover

There is a new skill being introduced that'll reduce the NPC portion of the tax by up to half.

"We are introducing a new trainable skill, Customs Code Expertise, which will reduce the NPC portion of the tax rate, but 10% per level (so at level 5 the NPC export tax rate will be 5% rather than 10%). Again, this skill only affects the NPC portion of the tax, not the player owner tax." - CCP SoniClover

The exact numbers might work out a little different after the patch but what it boils down to is lower output and higher costs for hi sec PI than for PI anywhere else. Just how it is now. Nothing's really changed except of course someone will have to shoot down the Interbus Customs Office and replace it with his own... Which he'll have to pay for and which in turn can be shot down by someone else.

Sounds worthwhile. NOT!

I expect hi sec POCOS will fall into 2 types. Ones with no (or very low) player tax but restricted access (mainly restricted to the corp the owner belongs to) and ones with unrestricted access but higher player taxes. High enough to make the total tax (npc tax + player tax) at least as high as it is now even with the new skill fully trained.

Anyone who thinks the big null sec alliances (goons in particular) won't be sending fleets into hi sec regularly to blow up all Customs Offices (whether Interbus or player owned) they can find and replace them with their own high tax POCOs is dreaming.

Expect all the best planets near main trade hubs to be very quickly taken over by the big alliances. It won't be cost effective for the little guys to pay exorbitant war declaration fees trying to take them back from the big guys either.

I find it ironic how low and (especially) null sec players like to claim they're the elite, yet they always seem to need "special" treatment to give them unfair advantages over hi sec players.

No doubt the self proclaimed elite would rage but why not even things out? Stop pandering to the loud minority. Take away all the special snowflake treatment, all the "meta game" BS and let the players decide for themselves for a change.

Edit: Mabrick's take on this is really good. He brings up a number of valid points, like how tying attacking POCOs to war decs squeezes out the little guys (solo players and small corps) and hands hi sec PI over to the big PvP corps and alliances.

Make no mistake this is not a buff to hi sec PI. It's a blatant resource control giveaway for the big PvP corps and alliances.

Financial Report - September 2013

Financial report for the month of September 2013 (last month). Trade oriented since trading is how I make virtually all of my ISK.

I buy and sell skill-books, faction/deadspace/officer mods and implants with traders covering all 5 major trade hubs (Jita, Amarr, Dodixie,  Hek and Rens) plus secondary hubs in most other empire regions. I have 20 traders in total, 3 on Jita, one each for mods, implants and skillbooks, the rest covering 17 different regions.

In September I made 34 billion after expenses. Down 6 billion from last month. I spent less time working the market including a 2 week period during the middle of the month where I hardly did anything.

Current net worth is 304 billion with about half in cash and market escrow. Most of the rest is in sell orders and recently acquired stock I haven't gotten around to posting for sale yet.  As I get bigger and spend less time updating individual orders I find myself carrying more and more of my net worth in sell orders. Very little is in assets I don't intend to sell soon, a few ships and some mods I keep in stock for my own use, maybe 4 billion in total.

That's my actual current total net worth, I don't pad the numbers by counting ISK I've earned but have since spent and no longer have. That'd be like calling myself a real life millionaire because I've earned over a million dollars during my life when the reality is I've never had anywhere near a million in total.