i have to admit that i should stop when i get this " bad streak".
Hi there,
In general, "stop when getting a bad streak" sounds like a good advice, but there are a few important buts. The point is that "bad streak" in itself is a sort of gambling fallacy, because it implies the opposite being also true, "good streak". The important threshold is basically if you should push through. The answer would come from another basic idea, wether personal loot pool exists. As it was already stated by MA, I believe they don't.
Then as a matter of principle, you need a model after which to mine. That is to construct for yourself a definition of "good", "bad, "push through" etc.
In my view, over an unlimited number of events with an unlimited budget, you can mine anyway you like, as much as you like per day, at maximum turnover possible and you will be fine.
But these things don't exist, in real life we are limited by time, skills, budget, MU, presence/absence of mobs, speed of sales pvp or via auction etc.
As you put it, the problem is the budget. Pushing through in bad times might put the return in a situation of irreversible damage. I wholeheartly suggest reading atomicstorm's thread about "risk of ruin". It doesn't matter the actual discipline, is about getting a grasp of where to can you actually insist in a given situation. Even when is good.
In a bit more practical terms about what you wrote, with apologies for the lengthy introduction.
Average hitrate: 30,x%. Average size of find: small (on the lower end, 3,x or so tt). This would be the static result if you would average over hundreds of thousands of drops.
"Bad": 25% hitrate or less, BUT also with average size lower than 3x. Because, at 25% hitrate but with regular average find, you are in a situation where a reasonable situation (unamped "large" or "abundant") would balance the situation.
"Good": 40% hitrate with average finds. You're cashing in, pray for good droprate of 120% MU, a global or hof is bling-bling all the way to auction.
"Fantastic": 40%+ hitrate with globals left and right. It might happen a couple times per year, if you're counting on this, you're a hopless gambler.
D-Class has a magnification factor of 4. VIII claim on the higher end is what you're supposed to get as average find (so, 11-12 tt). However, there is a small trick there. Every tier of amps has its own hitrate variation. That is, it is more likely to get 33% hitrate unamped than to get this amped. The more you amp, the lower the hitrate gets. That happens in order to get enough big multipliers to advertise respective amp.
Therefore, there is no such thing as what size of claim you "should" get with an amp. This should be judged based on, mainly, experience. Only after tens of thousands of drops with same cost you'll be able to judge what is regular and what is exceptional for each tier and what can you expect.
Just for your info, the smallest possible mining find is actually "minimal" (up to 0,5 tt). While this is obfuscated and redistributed when mining unamped, it will appear when mining amped. So, if you get a "very poor" or "poor" with D-Class you didn't broke the game, you're just seeing the minimum possible. Also keep in mind that D-Class a magnification factor of 4 for ores, but for enmatter that is actually 8. This should happen though exceptionally rare, but from this perspective your VIII claims don't look so alien anymore, I think.
What you're confusing is "sizes I should get on a regular base" with "sizes I should get when things get good". While is normal for human mind to aim for the good situation, this doesn't mean that your mind has the power to bend reality, so don't be disappointed.
Then, TT in vs TT out is important only on an adequate number of drops. Speaking on lvl5's, so lower than your D-Class, in my experience, 50 amps are not enough to regulate it to the average. That is almost 5k drops and my return rate was roughly 85% tt-wise.+- 1-2%, depend how you judge the finder and excavator.
Just fyi, for a hairline under 50k tt, which I logged for the past two months, I am at 101% or so. Including finder, excavator and refiner decay I am almost suspiciously close to 100%, with a difference of few peds most likely for something logged wrong. For the purpose of this log, I left the tower out, because my suspicion was and is that such high multiplier (6k or so) is akin to a jackpot and out of the regular turnover.
Problem is, the jackpots can also be negative. That is where I am against "pushing through". I prefer the more easily reproductible roleplaying mining, where "if there are no finds here, thef*ck am I doing here??".
Lastly, your quoted runs are abysmail in size and you are exclusively gambling. 300 ped tt turnover is nothing even unamped. In order to qualify as a "run", even unamped I am looking at roughly 5-600.
For a practical advice: switch planets. Pick a mining habit which you can sustain. You should have cash for at least 2k drops to mitigate a bit the tt variation. This is unamped. For each level of amping, I would adjust the budget 1,5x. That is, 3k drops with lvl2, 4,5k drops with lvl3 etc. Lvl5 amps I would say 10k drops. If in 5k drops I didn't saw the expected tt return (98-99%tt), I would believe with 10k I am not exagerate. Be the judge where D-Class should stay, in my view. And that is drops, not tt.
This would be for perpetual amping. Of course you can develop for yourself a style where you "pick-up" or "drop" amps as zpf wrote, but then if you'd see that working (or rather if you'd know when and what) this thread wouldn't be here.
Of course, mandatory LBML to be sure you're not overlapping. Also for hitrate, don't count on your personal perception. Hope there is at least one line helpful in what I wrote. gl!
