Friday, October 14, 2016

Raitaru, Raitaru, Wherefore Art Thou?

So let's talk more about Engineering Complexes.

We got more details on the structures in a dev blog earlier this week titled Building Dreams: Introducing Engineering Complexes. These are the structures intended to replace the manufacturing and science capabilities of Outposts and POS arrays, up to and including the production of Super capitals (with appropriate sov control of course for the latter). They have a lot of similarities to Citadels including asset safety, docking, corporate hangers, vulnerability windows, reinforcements, etc. On the other hand, they have lower build requirements thus lower costs; for example, a medium Astrahus citadel costs about 1 billion ISK to produce while the corresponding medium Raitaru will run around 700 million ISK at the same material prices. They also have longer vulnerability windows (3 hours for Astrahus, 9 hours for Raitaru), and tighter docking restrictions: the Large EngPlex can build and launch capitals but can't dock them like the large Citadel can, and similar situation with XLarge and super capitals. Related: the Medium Raitara cannot build capitals.

There is no word on the BPO costs yet, but assuming they follow the same price differential ratio as the structures themselves, I expect the medium BPO to be about 5 billion, large ~50 billion, and extra-large 500 billion ISK.

So What Does this Mean for Me?

Overall, this is not very good news for me. I was willing to invest in a EngPlex costing about the order of magnitude of an Astrahus for my capital and structure producing projects, but the Medium Raitaru cannot build the capitals and the Large Azbel complex at 5.2 billion ISK just for the structure is too rich with too much risk (i.e. large vulnerability window) that I alone cannot mitigate and therefore justify. Someone building Tech II ships might make a lone go out of a Raitaru, but in that case why not simply use a POS manufacturing array at a far lower investment cost?

And that's the rub: small time producers are not served by these structures at all. With the savings in terms of materials and time these promise to provide, small time producers in NPC stations or private POSes are going to be out-competed by any small group or larger working together in a EngPlex. Its the same issue as POS versus NPC station only writ larger.

Short term, I plan to build Raitaru EngPlexes and sell them for profit like I do for Astrahus Citadels. Putting one up for my own building is a possibility if I can build capital and structure components in one but I have a feeling the answer might be no, some investigation is required. Long term, it looks like cooperation with some other people or entities will be required to advance Ninveah Enterprises to the next level.

UPDATE:

I found on the rig spreadsheet evidence that suggests one can build capital construction components, structure components, and structures themselves in a Raitaru:

So while I can't build capitals in a Medium Eng Plex, I might be able to improve efficiency with a Raitaru after all. More investigation required.

7 comments:

  1. "Overall, this is not very good news for me. "

    Understatement of the year.

    Dinsdale was right, and that should be embarrassing for CCP. A couple of people are fighting the good fight against CCP in the forum thread (which included my quitting post, alas), and it'd be great if you could stick your problems in there.

    Unfortunately, they're also fighting against Imperium shills, but you can ignore them. They don't care that they're proven wrong, so long as CCP does what they want them to do. (As the Citadel Taxes thread proved.)

    Alas, Ninveah enterprises just isn't donating enough money to beat Big Industry. Press for more regulation to ensure a place for the little guy!

    Rabble Rabble!!!

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    1. I have been right on many things. BTW, saw your reddit post. Just wait until early next year when POS's are wiped out. (think the anchoring freeze starts in Nov). I am also waiting for the next shoe to drop and we get another jump in trading fees to "encourage" the use of the Citadels. Oh yeah, we will be seeing an extension of the fees to contracts as well.

      This all started with Crius, when the cartels told CCP that the only way to have this occupancy based bullshit to work is to crush high sec industry, and they will complete that job with November's release and then the removal of POS's.

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    2. No, you are a broken clock that happens to get the time correct twice in one day.

      POS cannot be removed currently because of several utilities which are yet to replicated within the Engineering Array; such as Booster production. (but don't quote me).

      As far is goes, I dare say a promise has curb stomped. "for big and small" But so far we have large plus sizes. (reminds of condoms being sold in Japan; Large, Huge and Enormous- because who wants to buy "small"). I see nothing in the current iteration which supports a micro corp or casual player.

      The issue is not the Cartels, but having a central player market. The entire market needs to de-centralised. Without Jita, null sec cannot easily import.;

      1. introduce a population usage levy on the market. Same a what has already been done to Industry. Which would make all of hubs unprofitable.
      2. Require the disabling of external marketing tools which are work arounds to current intended in-game limit of Regional Market ranges. (why is this not botting?!)
      3. Disallow all Capital ships, by adding Freighters to restricted list in high-sec.
      4. Introduce random Pirate Faction incursions into the border constellations between the high-sec empires. These would have the effect reducing the security status into Low Sec values.

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  2. Nothing is being removed in November. At all. In DECEMBER there will be a freeze on new OUTPOSTS. This is the only change to existing structures we know about.

    CCP won't even start discussing the freezing of POSs until a month or so after Drilling Platforms come out. So at this point I'm expecting POSs won't be removed at least for a full year yet.

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  3. I ran some calculations and came to the same conclusions. If you are not in a corporation or alliance dedicated to manufacturing as a team, these structures are much less than optimal, especially when compared to POS options today. Further, the message from CCP is obvious: manufacturing in null-sec is strongly preferred. Too bad - I enjoyed running a nominally profitable operation in high-sec, but it's clearly time to find another way to earn an income in New Eden.

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    1. Gee, think someone else said that when Crius came out. Hate being right, again.

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    2. The sky is not falling.

      A medium engineering complex that operates in high sec will get bonuses of 3% ME and 30% TE for T1 rigs factoring in the +25% bonus to the effect of rigs the complex gets. This stands in comparison to the current bonuses you get from assembly arrays in a POS at +2% and +25%, so this is a buff (albeit to only one group of manufactures since the rigs only apply to a limited group).

      The trade offs are in (3) areas:

      1. You get a buff to one area of manufacturers but all others take a hit for those operating in HS with a medium/large, there are not enough rig slots to buff all areas of manufactures. Poses can online every time of module without penalty (except PG/CPU limitations!)

      2. For a medium user you are paying out 20 blocks/hour to use the manufacturing module in comparison with the Medium POS at an identical 20 blocks/hour. However, I contend this actually reduces maintenance since refueling the complex is far easier than refueling the POS (especially since failing to fuel your complex doesn't expose you to immediate loss of everything in it!)

      3. Ease of use. Setting up, using, and maintaining inventories in a POS is a nightmare for any process that is large or uses multiple arrays. The unified inventory possible in a complex greatly decreases the amount of time necessary to set up, maintain, and finish jobs. (Also the ability to put it anywhere guarantees that the system you want to operate in will have an open spot unlike the spots taken up with unused poses in HS/LS - you can now operate closure to trade hubs!)

      On top of these benefits HS maintains the greatest advantage of all, scale. The logistics and risk necessary to operate industry in null sec and low sec continue to be the biggest impediment to competing with HS. HS will remain the high volume producer of almost everything. The lowsec / nullsec advantages will remain to increase profitability but the nature of the space makes real competition on volume difficult to all but large groups that really focus on the effort (for which they ought to be rewarded).

      Focus on the benefits and you'll see there will easily be several areas where manufactures in HS get the better of things.

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