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John uncguy43 Williams

John uncguy43 Williams

Guardian
Joined
Sep 13, 2021
Posts
287
Hi All,

I figured it was time to get back to Entropia after a fairly extended break. I enjoy the process of logging, so I decided I would make a log that records my mining results every ~5k ped (remember, that's $500). My starting budget this time will be ~3k PED ($300). I will probably be mining unamped for quite some time until I relearn my areas and gain some confidence, or I may just mine unamped indefinitely. We'll see!

I take meticulous notes, and I record all of my markup input, markup output, and TT cycled including refiner costs, excavator costs, and any et ceteras. I record markup when it sells and subtract auction fees where applicable. My MU figures aren't real-time with each cycle. My TT returns are real-time.

Hope you enjoy reading!

Run #1:

TT Cost - 4,977.57
TT Return - 4,927.26 (98.98% TT)
MU Sold - 227.14
MU Input - 82.84 (mainly enhancer [depth, speed] breakage and DSEC L30 MU plus a couple other little odds and ends)
TT+MU Return = 103.57%
All-in return = 101.88%

Notes: As I remembered, markup still seems to be best on Arkadia. I'll probably spend the bulk of my time there moving forward. Considering doing future runs with the Terramaster finders instead of DSEC since it's so much cheaper MU-wise. It would slow down the cycling considerably, though, so we'll see.
 
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GLGL on your ventures!

:cool:
 
Run #2:

TT Cost - 5,023.41
TT Return - 5,976.46 (118.97% TT)
MU Sold - 193.52
MU Cost - 251.28
TT+MU Return = 122.82%
All-in return = 117.82%

Notes - Went ahead and frontloaded the MU cost of two new finders with the positive TT return: a DSEC L30 and a Terramaster 8. I was pleasantly surprised by how cheap the MU is on the Terramaster 8 (~115%). Really not much more than a Terramaster 6 (~113%) and much cheaper than a DSEC L30 (~140%), both of which seem to be used much more commonly. I'm guessing it's because there's not a lot of demand for the Terra 8s since not many people have the skills to use them in addition to other factors. I am maxed on it for ore hunting and need one more level for enmatter, then we'll be in business.

Have some MU from the last two runs that still needs to sell before I can mark it down.

Reached level 59 miner with this run. Wish it mattered.
 
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Run #3:

TT Cost - 5,018.34
TT Return - 5,007.72 (99.78% TT)
MU Sold - 422.82
MU Cost - 134.18
TT+MU Return = 108.21%
All-in return = 105.54%

Notes - I'm sure that the eventual TT downswing is coming. For the time being, enjoying the very nice TT returns and going to focus even more on generating markup. A lot of it comes down to whether or not the "big hits" are on high MU resources as to what the average MU % is going to be on a given run.
 
Run #4:

TT Cost - 5206.62
TT Return - 4181.29 (80.31% TT)
MU Sold - 386.52
MU Cost - 123.3
TT+MU Return = 87.73%
All-in return = 85.36%

Notes - Knew the TT downswing had to come sooner or later. Hopefully, this means better days ahead. Personally, I would far rather prefer stable 93-96% TT returns and never experience a global or a HOF, but I know not everyone is that way. At the end of the day, my results so far are 99+% TT, so no reason to complain.

Anyways, here is the total for the log so far:

TT Cost - 20,225.94
TT Return - 20092.73 (99.34% TT)
MU Sold - 1230
MU Cost - 591.60
TT+MU Return = 105.45%
All-in return = 102.40%

EDIT: Reached Prospector Level 63 during this run. Wish it mattered.
 
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As my good friend Jade once said during a down slump..... "there seems to be some unusual suckitude in the air". Now at 79% TT returns on my last 7.3k ($730) cycled and I have to say: it's pretty mentally draining to spend so much time and lose so much, even though I know full well it's likely only temporary.

Time will tell - will I continue to take it up the proverbial butthole? Or will things even out in the K's to come? Stay tuned...
 
John uncguy43 Williams said:
As my good friend Jade once said during a down slump..... "there seems to be some unusual suckitude in the air". Now at 79% TT returns on my last 7.3k ($730) cycled and I have to say: it's pretty mentally draining to spend so much time and lose so much, even though I know full well it's likely only temporary.

Time will tell - will I continue to take it up the proverbial butthole? Or will things even out in the K's to come? Stay tuned...
Click to expand...
" The world is still the same.....theres just less in it... i know the feel. ive kinda stopped mining atm myself since im waiting for the market to spike a bit. When the going gets tough and you stuck in a storm, you gotta put up your shields, whether you move forward or wait for the storm to pass is your call.
 
Jade Draconis said:
" The world is still the same.....theres just less in it... i know the feel. ive kinda stopped mining atm myself since im waiting for the market to spike a bit. When the going gets tough and you stuck in a storm, you gotta put up your shields, whether you move forward or wait for the storm to pass is your call.
Click to expand...
My personal choice is probably going to be to take a week away from the game and then see if anything has changed when I come back.

TL;DR - going to take some time away. Keep reading if you dare...

For those who have followed along on my log so far, you can see that I've been running pretty low on average MU %, but that hasn't mattered up to this point because I've had really good TT returns. Over the last 5k cycled, when TT returns hovered around 80%, I figured it was time to start backing off cycle speed and focus on leaning into the areas where I knew that MU was high and, just as important, consistent in loot composition.

However, there has been an interesting phenomenon at play. I'm using the right gear in the right spots where you usually get both high MU AND high consistency of solid loot composition, but lately the composition has been poor. Where it used to be 50% Garcen, 30% Angelic Grit, and 20% crude oil (~114% average MU) ...now it's 80% crude oil and 20% Garcen (~103.64% average MU). In other words, I haven't been able to get my MU % up even though my cycle speed has slowed considerably, and that has never been a problem before. And unfortunately, the TT return % has remained abysmally low.

Here's the results of the latest, abbreviated run (Run #5):
TT Cost - 4,090.39
TT Return - 3,434.59 (83.96% TT)
MU Sold - 57.15
MU Cost - 97.68
TT+MU Return = 85.36%
All-in return = 82.97%

Notes - the MU Cost vs. MU Sold here is a little bit misleading because I record MU Sold....as it sells, whereas MU cost is frontloaded. I bought a new finder this round towards the end, so all of that cost input is frontloaded.

Over the last 10.5k cycled ($1,050 USD) over 8 days, I've received 86.56% TT back.

To put that into context of how it feels: it feels like I've spent roughly ~40 hours of my free time losing $150 USD when I could have been playing DOTA (just made Crusader III, y'all!) for free and probably gotten a lot more enjoyment out of it.

The rational part in me tells me that I'll get some of that back and markup will cover the losses and then some eventually. But there's also another rational part in me that goes: "What incentive does MA have to give anything back? If I'm them, I'm not giving it back."

Then again, to put things in context for myself: so far I've cycled 24,316 ($2,431.60) and received a 96.76% TT return. My markup has averaged 5.49% so far, so I haven't done a good job of obtaining high average MU for myself. At a minimum, I think I could boost that to 8-9% easily and perhaps higher from time to time with a little bit of luck. At any rate, we'll see what the future holds. Peace for now!
 
I am having the same issue with TT returns, and since starting MRP ENTERPRISES the avg TT returns have been around 96.74%.

But I have personally lost a heck of a lot of TT approximately -600 ped so far whilst mining unamped or using Level 1-2 amps.

Here are my current stats with pending auctions.
Gross MU %: 11.56% - (before auction fees)
Net MU % 8.22% - (after auction fees)
Avg MU/TT: 9.05% - (TT returns + Net MU)
 
M Rufen Power said:
I am having the same issue with TT returns, and since starting MRP ENTERPRISES the avg TT returns have been around 96.74%.

But I have personally lost a heck of a lot of TT approximately -600 ped so far whilst mining unamped or using Level 1-2 amps.

Here are my current stats with pending auctions.
Gross MU %: 11.56% - (before auction fees)
Net MU % 8.22% - (after auction fees)
Avg MU/TT: 9.05% - (TT returns + Net MU)
Click to expand...
seems this is the storm we have to wither through before the next mayhem
 
Against my better judgment, I went ahead and mined some more last night/today after making some PED doing some other activities that I think will be steady for me moving forward. So far, 106.7% TT on ~2800 cycled, so it would seem that things are turning back up. MU finding has also been great. Will provide a detailed update @ 5k cycled like usual. Found 376 ped of Ignis on that small amount of cycle without having any globals or HOFs on it.

My three "major hits" so far have been:
  • ~470 Lysterium
  • ~875 Veda
  • ~1850 Ospra
It's unfortunate that those have drug down my average MU so much, but hopefully I'll get lucky eventually and future "big hits" will be on MU resources.

Also, thinking about making a thread in the general discussion area detailing "my failures" - things I substantively tried and lost PED doing - so that hopefully others have some insight before they try those things too. I fully understand players not sharing info on activities that work for them - I don't either - but I think we would all benefit from learning about things that just don't work.
 
Unfortunately, things didn't stay as rosy as I had hoped to finish this run cycle.

Run #6:
TT Cost - 5616.28
TT Return - 5220.33 (92.95% TT)
MU Sold - 442.86
MU Cost - 157.96
TT+MU Return = 100.84%
All-in return = 98.02%

Over the last ~15k cycled I'm at 86% TT. That said, I'm at 96.04% TT for the whole log of about ~30k cycled. So, I'm really not sure whether more "pain" is ahead or not.

Despite my best efforts, getting my average MU up enough to justify the time spent mining so far hasn't happened as of yet. My all-in return (TT Return + MU Sold - MU Cost) for the full log is 99.13%. Said another way, I've spent days and days of time and lost 264 PEDs when it was said and done. That said, my average MU so far has been only 6.06%.

My next ploy to get average MU up will be to spend days and days on Rocktropia and see what happens. At least in theory, I should be able to pull out ~110% MU on the regular there, as ores obtained are consistent and big hits on alt aren't capped. But we will see.

Open to tips.
 
John uncguy43 Williams said:
Unfortunately, things didn't stay as rosy as I had hoped to finish this run cycle.

Run #6:
TT Cost - 5616.28
TT Return - 5220.33 (92.95% TT)
MU Sold - 442.86
MU Cost - 157.96
TT+MU Return = 100.84%
All-in return = 98.02%

Over the last ~15k cycled I'm at 86% TT. That said, I'm at 96.04% TT for the whole log of about ~30k cycled. So, I'm really not sure whether more "pain" is ahead or not.

Despite my best efforts, getting my average MU up enough to justify the time spent mining so far hasn't happened as of yet. My all-in return (TT Return + MU Sold - MU Cost) for the full log is 99.13%. Said another way, I've spent days and days of time and lost 264 PEDs when it was said and done. That said, my average MU so far has been only 6.06%.

My next ploy to get average MU up will be to spend days and days on Rocktropia and see what happens. At least in theory, I should be able to pull out ~110% MU on the regular there, as ores obtained are consistent and big hits on alt aren't capped. But we will see.

Open to tips.
Click to expand...
On RT i would play around with Dragon Kingdom. the avg mu there prob beats the belk/alt area considering it has quantium/Alt/lyst/ garcen/henren/gazz/garcen/solis/ dianthus
 
Iceman2003 said:
yes, that is correct, harder to hit mu ore/enm with amps. still you can get it but between hits you get lyst/oil/and tt food. So on the wave you might miss most of those better mu minerals
Click to expand...
they changed the waves on caly about 2 years ago so now waves on caly arent 100% wave ores/enmatter anymore
 
Iceman2003 said:
yes, that is correct, harder to hit mu ore/enm with amps. still you can get it but between hits you get lyst/oil/and tt food. So on the wave you might miss most of those better mu minerals
Click to expand...
Sounds like I'll be sticking to the alt/belkar area until I get rid of some amps, then. It might be better to just go slower for better MU after that. At the end of the day, it's all about having that relaxing mining session and knowing that, regardless of how the individual run goes, you'll do well over time with MU. I'm not here to make millions :ROFLMAO:
 
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Going to end this 5k a little early since the last 5k went a little over. I hope that the information listed in the notes and musings sections below the raw results helps some of you who are aspiring miners.

Run #7:
TT Cost - 4,763.24
TT Return - 5,083.04 (106.71% TT)
MU Sold - 247.03
MU Cost - 259.92
TT+MU Return = 111.90%
All-in return = 106.44%

Note #1 - The MU cost here is somewhat heavily weighted because I tiered up my trusty Earth Excavator ME/01 to Tier 4 and T4 components are pricey. The MU Sold also largely doesn't reflect any of the markup ready to be sold from this run (or some previous runs).

Note #2 - I realized that there is an error in my figures from earlier which I will not edit externally because it would require me to go back and edit many of the prior posts. Basically, I bought a Terramaster 8 at one point and went ahead and recorded it in my TT Costs before it was actually used. I ordinarily do that because, though not technically correct, it saves me the time of having to account for finder costs on every little sub-run. Then, for other reasons, I sold it before it was even partially used and forgot to edit my data. So, my TT costs are actually ~300 PED or so lower and my MU costs are actually ~50 PED or so lower on the full log than recorded. Taken together with the most recent ~5k cycled, this actually means that I am profitable through ~35k PED cycled.

Note #3 - I'm very glad I came to Rocktropia. You can figure out the rest for yourselves.

Musings -
In any profession, you have to continually learn just to have a chance to be profitable after markup. One thing I have really grasped recently is that unlimited amp prices are absolutely ridiculous at their current asking prices and given the relative cost of L amps.

I'll explain. Given resource caps, the only unlimited amp I would even consider buying would be an UL 2 amp. Based on available data, those go for around TT+ 12,000 ped. However... Consider that you can buy limited L2 amps in bulk for 103-103.5%, or a MU cost of 3 - 3.5 PED/amp. That means you would need to cycle through the UL amp (12,000 / 3.5) = 3,428 times just to break even on the markup versus buying limited L2 amps.

Said another way, you would need to cycle over 340k PED or 640,000 drops just to recoup your upfront cost.

I might make 300 drops/day if I'm lucky. So, the average seller of an UL L2 amp is essentially asking that I pay $1,200 in real money UPFRONT to spend 2,133 days (5.8 YEARS) of cycling at my current rate just to breakeven on the cost, much less begin to profit from cost savings thereafter. I'll stick to L, thank you.

Don't even get me started about the cost of the higher level amps.
 
John uncguy43 Williams said:
Going to end this 5k a little early since the last 5k went a little over. I hope that the information listed in the notes and musings sections below the raw results helps some of you who are aspiring miners.

Run #7:
TT Cost - 4,763.24
TT Return - 5,083.04 (106.71% TT)
MU Sold - 247.03
MU Cost - 259.92
TT+MU Return = 111.90%
All-in return = 106.44%

Note #1 - The MU cost here is somewhat heavily weighted because I tiered up my trusty Earth Excavator ME/01 to Tier 4 and T4 components are pricey. The MU Sold also largely doesn't reflect any of the markup ready to be sold from this run (or some previous runs).

Note #2 - I realized that there is an error in my figures from earlier which I will not edit externally because it would require me to go back and edit many of the prior posts. Basically, I bought a Terramaster 8 at one point and went ahead and recorded it in my TT Costs before it was actually used. I ordinarily do that because, though not technically correct, it saves me the time of having to account for finder costs on every little sub-run. Then, for other reasons, I sold it before it was even partially used and forgot to edit my data. So, my TT costs are actually ~300 PED or so lower and my MU costs are actually ~50 PED or so lower on the full log than recorded. Taken together with the most recent ~5k cycled, this actually means that I am profitable through ~35k PED cycled.

Note #3 - I'm very glad I came to Rocktropia. You can figure out the rest for yourselves.

Musings -
In any profession, you have to continually learn just to have a chance to be profitable after markup. One thing I have really grasped recently is that unlimited amp prices are absolutely ridiculous at their current asking prices and given the relative cost of L amps.

I'll explain. Given resource caps, the only unlimited amp I would even consider buying would be an UL 2 amp. Based on available data, those go for around TT+ 12,000 ped. However... Consider that you can buy limited L2 amps in bulk for 103-103.5%, or a MU cost of 3 - 3.5 PED/amp. That means you would need to cycle through the UL amp (12,000 / 3.5) = 3,428 times just to break even on the markup versus buying limited L2 amps.

Said another way, you would need to cycle over 340k PED or 640,000 drops just to recoup your upfront cost.

I might make 300 drops/day if I'm lucky. So, the average seller of an UL L2 amp is essentially asking that I pay $1,200 in real money UPFRONT to spend 2,133 days (5.8 YEARS) of cycling at my current rate just to breakeven on the cost, much less begin to profit from cost savings thereafter. I'll stick to L, thank you.

Don't even get me started about the cost of the higher level amps.
Click to expand...
Great post :)
 
If the state of mining is currently "use small amp or no markup" it just doesn't seem worth it.
Drilling already slows down our cycle speed tremendously... Level 2 amps? Slave wages...

Few years ago alt rock was selling at 120%+ and you could slap on a D class and print money.
Sounds like those times are over...
 
ZPF said:
If the state of mining is currently "use small amp or no markup" it just doesn't seem worth it.
Drilling already slows down our cycle speed tremendously... Level 2 amps? Slave wages...

Few years ago alt rock was selling at 120%+ and you could slap on a D class and print money.
Sounds like those times are over...
Click to expand...
A lot of rare resources are TT capped per wave and lvl 2-3 amps are the best atm because of the way the caps work on a lot of the rarer mats.
 
ZPF said:
If the state of mining is currently "use small amp or no markup" it just doesn't seem worth it.
Drilling already slows down our cycle speed tremendously... Level 2 amps? Slave wages...

Few years ago alt rock was selling at 120%+ and you could slap on a D class and print money.
Sounds like those times are over...
Click to expand...

John uncguy43 Williams said:
At the end of the day, it's all about having that relaxing mining session and knowing that, regardless of how the individual run goes, you'll do well over time with MU. I'm not here to make millions :ROFLMAO:
Click to expand...
I might also push back against the idea that you could "print money" in the alt area when alt was at ~120%. Back then, D-class amps went for higher MU. So, let's say you paid 8 ped/amp back then and you did a 5-amp run with dsec L30 only mining for ores. The math there would be:

Drop Cost: 6 (4 PED from amp and 2 PED from finder) x 200 (# of single drops you could get out of 5 amps) = 1200 PED
Estimated TT Return = .95 * 1200 = 1140
MU Cost = ~40, more with the finder, but let's just use amp MU for simplicity
MU composition of return was probably around 115% after including belkar and copper, so MU received back would be 15% * 1140 = 171
The consider auction fees, probably around 10 PED
Extraction cost would be around .5% of TT return if using eco extractor, so 5.70 PED
Refining cost would be around 1% of TT because alt is expensive to refine, so 11.40 PED

Therefore, all in return would be 1140 (TT Return) +171 (MU Gained) - 40 (Amp MU Cost) - 10 (Auction Fees) - 5.7 (Extraction cost) - 11.4 (Refining cost) = 1243 / 1200 (TT cycle) = 103.58%

I would hardly call 3.58% "printing money" especially considering that extracting all that alt would probably take close to 2-3 hours. That's less than $2/hour of work.

I write all this not to belittle you - I think you're a wise person based on prior posts I've seen from you. Rather, I write it for two reasons:

1) So that future players that read it can have appropriate expectations. I have played the game for 2+ years now and have never found a way to "print money" after all costs are accounted for appropriately. And I don't say that to gripe...I love this game! I'm finally at a spot where I can profit 1-3% in all activities. And you know what? That's cents/hour...but it's fun!

2) Any time I tried to make money fast in this game, I got slaughtered.

There may well be ways to make money much more quickly in-game, you'll never read about those here and they're likely to evaporate quickly when discovered.
 
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John uncguy43 Williams said:
Back then, D-class amps went for higher MU
Click to expand...
It was years ago so I don't remember exactly, but if this is true then I was probably using DSEC-L30 + Level 5, basically the same thing for much lower MU.

RT was just one example. You could run large amps and still hit respectable amounts of MU just about anywhere...
 
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You can change the MU on the amp costs ever so slightly (L5 vs d-class) and it might get you up to 5-6% all-in profit. But L5 actually increases the time spent since you get more size 8 and lower claims which have to be picked up within an hour.

The point is that it’s - at maximum - a few dollars an hour you can make even at steady ~115% ending average markup. That’s hardly “printing money”.

My prior post was meant to be helpful in setting expectations for miners at large. Not to degrade you or make you feel like it was a personal attack. I couldn’t care to do something like that.

I write all this not to belittle you - I think you're a wise person based on prior posts I've seen from you.
Click to expand...
 
John uncguy43 Williams said:
printing money
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You seem to be hung up on my choice of words. It was low effort steady profit, which seems to be elusive nowadays. The best part was most of your HoFs would be on alt instead of some 101% trash so it felt less like gambling.

On the nicer spots on Arkadia/Caly (non-pvp) you could probably make closer to minimum wage farming dianthus or ignisium both of which you could hit with a level 5 amp.

John uncguy43 Williams said:
setting expectations for miners at large.
Click to expand...
Your log is a great PSA for new miners, they should absolutely know if the game no longer has a reasonable balance between cycle speed and average MU.
If the game is going to throttle you at level 2, buying that UL level 5, UL Terra Master Gold Rush or UL Improved excavator might not be worth it.
 
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