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Mining Guide/Ships
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The final part of this guide is dedicated to mining ships, and my personal opinion of them. I will also provide links to their respective wiki pages, where you can get more info about them concerning stats and stuff like that.
General mining ships
These ships can be used by any mining faction, except ALG and Junkers, who each have special ships to do their job with. If ALG or Junker pilots use general ships, they won't get there bonus for mining scrap or toxic waste. Also, Junkers using ALG equipment or ALG using Junker equipment won't get any bonus neither. The independent miner ID only works on General mining ships.
Basalt
This is the ship that you get when using the /restart miner command. It's the smallest and by far the cheapest mining ship around.
Classed as a Light Fighter, it's one of the few LF that is capable of mounting fighter torpedos. This can provide it with some much needed firepower when encountering bigger enemy ships when serving as an escort. However I wouldn't suggest you use this ship any longer than you need to, as it isn't a good ship to mine in. The reason for this is that its only turret mount is rear facing, which forces you to go into turret mode in order for you to mine with any efficiency.
Dacite
Next in line is the Dacite, a major improvement over the Basalt, this Very Heavy Fighter is more than capable of defending itself. But the most important improvement over the basalt is definitely its forward facing turret, which allows you to mine in cockpit view.
It's also very good to escort with, seeing as it can hold 6 guns whilst its profile is rather small. However, you'll never see me flying in one of these for 1 reason. IT IS UGLY, no seriously I can't stand the look of this thing, I forced myself to fly it around a bit to test it out, and while it performed better than I thought, the looks just make me resent it.
Mafic
The major improvement that the Mafic has over the Dacite is most definitely its ability to mount freighter shields and it improved power core, which allows this thing to mount even bomber torpedoes. I personally have a SNAC (Super Nova Antimatter Cannon) on it and it works wonders for me. It is however rather slow and doesn't
Even though this isn't a bomber, you'll be able to take on most pirates flying transport, and 2 of these can make short work of gunboats. In short this is a miner who packs quite a significant amount of firepower and is more than capable to defend his hauler against possible attacks. However much like the Dacite, its looks aren't very nice, still much better than the dacite, but they don't have the feeling of being Freelancer ships around them.
Spatial
The spatial is much like the Mafic, only this one has even more firepower in terms of regular guns. This allows it to fight fighters a bit easier than the Mafic. Not to mention that is has 2 mine droppers, which make these ships extremely lethal in the hands of a skilled mine dropper. All this comes at a cost however, as the Spatial is significantly larger than the Mafic. Personally, I prefer this one over the Mafic, simply because of its superior firepower and much better looks.
Hegemon
This is the absolute big shot of any other mining ship, this baby is the only transport classed general mining ship and it looks exactly like many of the stationary miners you can see around Sirius. The Wiki has a nice review of it, so I suggest you read it.
This is also the best ship for miner/haulers, since it has the largest possible cargo hold of all general mining ships. However it is big and you can get stuck when trying to dock with trade lanes or flying through asteroid fields. For weapons, I suggest you use the first 2 turret slots to place mining turrets, and all the other for defensive turrets, although some people prefer to put mining turrets on all 10 slots, this makes no significant difference in terms of mining bonus or speed of mining.
ALG mining ships
Rheinland Armored Transport
Though its name says it's a transport, this thing is only a freighter in reality, which means it can't carry transport shields. This is the cheapest mining ship available to Rheinland, but that doesn't take away the fact that this ship is a very descend mining ship. These ships can be used to fill up bigger ships, then fill themselves and fly as escorts along the bigger ships. Some people will say it's stupid to think that freighters are any good, but I find that they can sometimes surprise pirates, mainly due to the fact that they are highly underestimated. Fly one yourself and see how much fire power one seemingly insignificant freighter has.
Behemoth
This is the Rheinland middle sized transport. Personally I would only suggest these to those that don't have very much money and wish to Role Play an ALG miner/Transport. Mining with it can be surprisingly pleasant none the less, as it turns much faster than the hegemon and has a much smaller profile than the Hegemon. This makes this ship very capable of moving through asteroid fields.
Golem
This is without any doubt the biggest ship in terms of cargo space that gets a mining bonus. However this comes at the cost of having the worst turning rate of any of the mining ships. In terms of size, it's smaller than the hegemon, apart from perhaps its length. This slow turning can make it very annoying to mine, and is one of the reasons some people put full mining laser equipment on this ship and mine in turret view. But in my personal experience, both ways are equally fast, even though you get the feeling it goes faster in turret view. Ultimately, you should decide for yourself how to mine with this one.
Junker mining ships
CSV
The second smallest/cheapest mining ship of all, this ship is the one you get when using the /restart command (except for the miner restart). However it is highly unsuited as a mining ship for the same reason as the Basalt. Its only turret is rear facing, making it impossible to mine in cockpit view. The only reason anyone should use this ship is because they either like them, or they can't afford a better one yet. In my personal opinion, the description given on the wiki tends to make you believe it's better than it actually is.
Collector
A beefed up CSV, this ship has forward facing guns, which make it a suitable miner/escort. All I would add to this is that the wiki description is fairly accurate on this one, so make sure you read it.
Combat Service Freighter
The freighter version of the CSV, this basically is to the Junkers what the Rheinland armored transport is to ALG. The Wiki expresses my opinion on this ship, and I personally like it better than the RAT for some reason I can't really express.
Recycler
The recycler can be compared very closely to both the Mafic and the Spatial, in that it is a Super Heavy fighter which can mount a freighter shield and bomber torpedoes. It can even mount 2 of them, which make it more a bomber than a fighter. However I would highly recommend you don't put a SNAC on it for a simple reason. Namely that it's power core is only 75% of what the Mafic and spatial have, which isn't very impressive. This means that a single shot of the SNAC will completely drain your entire energy supply. However the dual mount can be very useful when combining a Nova Torpedo Launcher or a mini Razor with an Inferno. With this setup I have one day seen 2 recyclers along with a collector take down a shire in less than a minute, which is very impressive considering these aren't fully fledged bombers.
In my eyes, Recyclers are the best Miner/escorts any Junker mining group could have, and with it, the group could easily switch from mining to pirating without the need of other ships (do remember that Junkers can only pirate OUTSIDE house territory).
Salvager
This is the ship of choice for the Junkers who prefer solitude over group effort. The salvager is basically your every day transport, with the exception that it can carry gunboat weaponry, which drastically increases its killing potential.
However, for mining this ship can be rather annoying. It is extremely large when you look at it from above. The only reason it performs well in asteroid fields is because it is very thin. The best way to compare it is with a surf board. If you mine with this ship, I suggest you move sideways instead of up or downwards, otherwise you can be almost certain that you'll collide with the asteroids of the field you are mining in.
