Ma'adim: Direction?

[Jarkko]

Besides - they'll be useful also there

I seriously doubt it   Swuuler is my trader alt sitting in Jita, while Swuleia is the kamikaze pilot flying Ibises and Condors if distraction is needed

[Mangala]

Swuleia is the kamikaze pilot flying Ibises and Condors if distraction is needed

I smell a cyno alt

[peo]

How about we make some sort of "guidance document" as to what direction the corp is aiming currently?
Nothing complex of course but for example from what I have understood is our primary direction currently:
"Ma'adim is a pvp/industrial corp which current goal is to establish a industrial base in 0.0 in order to become a capital ship building corp in addition to this the corp has a goal of becoming Tech 3 producers with a heavy presence in W-Space to extract the needed resources to fuel T3 production and research"

In other words just something to sum up what we have for a aim for our own members, the corp description should be as empty as possible in game.

[Mangala]

I agree with that Peo, lets all have a play with words and see what we come up with. I'd prefer this direction to be a group thing rather than an "edict" from above.

One thing from my pov though:

capital ship building corp in addition to this the corp has a goal of becoming Tech 3 producers with a heavy presence in W-Space to extract the needed resources to fuel T3 production and research"

I think we should do one or the other. Both is alot harder to balance and could see us spread too thin with our current numbers - basically trying to do too much for our size. Hell the same could be said for thoughts of T2 production (although being part of a spaceholding alliance could help with that regards access to moons.)

[peo]

I'm no expert on production/research. Just seems that t3 would be a good and natural follow up on wh expeditions.

[Mangala]

I'm no expert on production/research. Just seems that t3 would be a good and natural follow up on wh expeditions.

Dont get me wrong I totally agree it is the best option regards wormholing, but doing it along with other isk and time intensive things like caps or t2 is not something to be undertaken lightly.  its one problem is - how certain is its future? How much will it be used by the playing populace? Is t3 really worth looking at at this early a stage given its semi-unfisihed and limited in scope?

Caps requires alot of isk for startup - we have a large number of the parts bpcs/bpos available which lessens that, but then theres the actual ship bp's to purchase (using BPC's is all well and good, but ideally we'd want our own bpo's so we arent paying out for bpc's lessening possible profits from every build, more so if we bill ourselves to alliances as cap builders - we wont be able to gouge our alliance mates just to keep a profit going as that can and does cause resentment.

T2 - needs moons for materials / reactions for the t2 components. Moons obviously require space holding/ability to defend operations and aid in overall security. Requires invention to get the T2 bpc's from t1 bpos using a stack of things from t1 versions of the thing you want all the way to decryptors and datacores.  Problem with this is - the better the moons the less likely a corp new to an alliance will be given access to what they have (and the universe's majority of r64 moons are in Russian (AAA's space is good for them) & Goon hands (Delve especially is covered in them). Beter moons give better reactions/moon mis for the better (read more expensive components). T2 production is nearly a closed business thanks to the mineral requirements of the component side of things and how volatile that market is (t2 component prices have seen a 25% rise in the past 4 months, resulting in t2 item/ship prices increasing too) whereas once it used to be limited due to T2 BPO ownership - lucky invention made that less of a limiting factor.

T3 looks easier to get into, can be done anywhere really with the 0.0/lowsec holes just giving a better chance of better materials from the sleepers/sites within them. Just takes time to skill for - tanking/dps skills, creation skills, exploration skills and what not and then time to get into the holes to do the shooty to haul stuff back and get the actual creation done.  Given its all findable, theres little isk layoput beyond the manufacturing side (im still unclear as to IF there are limits on where T3 ships can be built - ie it could be that they are limited to being built at poses and thats only in low or 0.0 etc)

[peo]

I personally don't think t2 is the way to go, if someone wants to do it by themselves go ahead but seems to be to complicated to get the materials to be a viable way to make money for the corp.

[peo]

If we are to pick one of cap and t3 I would be more inclined to go towards t3 since I think the potential profit there is far greater for us than in cap production. However it would require we get in from the start so we would get the bpo's for components researched to a high me/pe level and so on.

[Warcold]

At this moment I'd be more inclined to go for cap ships. W-space being a risky area, and we not being able to field 10-20 man gangs, serious ops in W-space are not something I see us do.

[Mangala]

If we are to pick one of cap and t3 I would be more inclined to go towards t3 since I think the potential profit there is far greater for us than in cap production. However it would require we get in from the start so we would get the bpo's for components researched to a high me/pe level and so on.

The blueprints drop as BPC's.

[Rubino]

There's a lot of profit to be made with T2 and while it's complicated - I don't think it's something we should dismiss lightly.

The main issue with T2, aside from the complexity, is that it's generally a personal rather than a corp enterprise.  The only involvement of the corp is really the POS reactions - emptying and filling the silos and moving the products of the reactions.  The moon we have in Fountain was chosen as I know some people would like to get into T2 production - and it provides 2 components used in T2 production.
I'll stick a Moon Harvester + solo on it shortly - it's just been a matter of priorities so far.  I don't think there will be an issue with moon access should we join an alliance - if the moon is empty then us dropping a POS on it wouldn't be a problem.  If somebody gives me an ordered list of which moon elements they want - I'll have something to refer to for future POS's.

I have experience with building Capitals in 0.0 - and one of the reasons it's profitable is that it's easy and very light in manpower and it's only requirement (outside of the BPOs) is minerals - which are usually easy to mine/buy.  While I've not started with any buy orders yet in Fountain - I'll be looking into it soon (again - my priority has been the move).  The BPOs are expensive but using BPC's as a stop-gap and then buying researched BPOs to get a complete set is a step-wise process.  The markets for Capitals (and T2) in 0.0 is fairly constant - which helps a lot with logistics (you don't need to move them much).  It's a very good profit maker for the corp - the Orcas we manufactured generated over 1B ISK profit for the corp.  Based on the corps Mineral Purchase Programme - Capitals tend to generate around 50% profit and have enabled us to implement the Industrial and Combat Ship Programmes for members.

The T3 market is something I think we should seriously consider.  It has strong parrallels with mining (both gas and minerals are needed) and it's a fairly simple process - less complicated than the T2 but a good stepping stone into T2.  T3 ships are very accessible to those in the corp and I prefer that the number 1 consumer of what we manufacture is the corp (a negative point for Capitals currently).  It also has the potenital to be a very good profit maker for the corp.  T3 can be done both in 0.0 and low-sec - I think only one part of the process (the fulleride reactions) require a POS.  T3 requires a fair amount of activity in W-Space.  The components come from actually doing the sites and as Beo just mentioned - some of BPC's drop from the site - the others have to be reverse engineered.  All BPC's so far are 3-run and we don't have much information regarding the frequency rate of drops.  From a Reverse Engineering side - the success rate is between 20-25% on the job.


Summary:
I'm not sure we need to pick one direction over the other at the moment.  We have some Capital Capability, some people want to go into T2 and others want T3.  The logical order of things (based on the manufacturing process) is: Capitals (mining), Tech 3 (mining/missions) and Tech 2 (logistics, research).


Update:
The Corp Purchase list will need to be updated to include T3 items to encourage participation in W-Space - which is no mean feat considering the unknown element of the sale price.  Maybe a baselined revsere manufacturing profit share is a better idea for the next couple of months. 

ie (numbers chosen at random and using a loose 2* multiplier for simplicity):
128 items needed to manufacture a T3 hull. 
Start with a baseline of each component that a player provides gives them 2/256th of the profit of the sale.  After week 1 - we asses drop rates based on what's been supplied and adjust (so part a drops twice as much and therefore gets 1/256th of the profit for the sale.  It's complicated but just one idea for an approach.

[peo]

If we are to pick one of cap and t3 I would be more inclined to go towards t3 since I think the potential profit there is far greater for us than in cap production. However it would require we get in from the start so we would get the bpo's for components researched to a high me/pe level and so on.

The blueprints drop as BPC's.

Are you sure??
Found this on the eve-o forums (which of course doesn't mean that it is right)
http://www.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=1025413

[Warcold]

Well this might be very obvious, but...
(IMHO-alert!) Before we decide to go T3, we might first want to make some test runs. How frequent can we do runs into W-space, how many ppl are willing/able to participate frequently etc.? Given we have lost some ppl playing regularly recently (Vac, Mac, .NERF) and that we might lose more ppl for whatever reasons, we might want to start out as simple as possible.
Our cap-ship program is far from complete, but we have put quite some effort/isk in it already.
My idea would be to use cap-production as a base and see what we can do on the side over the next month(s).

Possible drawbacks of this route:

doing it along with other isk and time intensive things like caps or t2 is not something to be undertaken lightly

[Mangala]

If we are to pick one of cap and t3 I would be more inclined to go towards t3 since I think the potential profit there is far greater for us than in cap production. However it would require we get in from the start so we would get the bpo's for components researched to a high me/pe level and so on.

The blueprints drop as BPC's.

Are you sure??
Found this on the eve-o forums (which of course doesn't mean that it is right)
http://www.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=1025413

I made the same mistake as the guy in that thread it seems.  So there are some BPO's for T3 stuff

[Rubino]

The universe wide avg of WH's is 1/3 systems have one.  Now not all WH's are created equal (and frequency data is incomplete) - the WH types found in empire are: K-Space <->K-Space, K-Space <-> W-Space.

Now you can use this data in 2 ways
(1) You can run a group and scan and you'll find an avg of 1 WH in every 3 systems
(2) A system will have a WH in every 3 days (bearing in mind that on avg a WH lasts a day if it expires due to time rather than mass)