I have started moving some of the roles previously assigned to my mining character off to Wilhelm, my main. Now, in addition to doing the hauling while he isn’t running missions, Wilhelm also does the refining.
I did not start down this path because I ran out of skills for Wil to train. There is a long list of shield, missile, power, and CPU related skills I would like to get him going on. And he needs them. I managed to lose another Caracal last weekend. I got in over my head and stuck next to a big object that kept me from aligning to warp out. And, as it usually goes, it wasn’t even a Charles Manson (kill everyone) mission, but just one of the “run in, grab something, and run away” variety. Irony dogs me like some giant, ironic, dog-like thing. My insurance agent is going to start raising my premiums soon!
No, the path was chosen to take advantage of Wilhelm’s much higher faction with the Caldari Navy to eke every last mineral out of the refining process. A few weeks of steady but flat mining income and I am looking for how to get more.
Fortunately Refining V was only a couple day haul for him, while Refining Efficiency I, II, and III were about a day, and then specialization in refining a few different ore types (Plaglioclase being first on the list), ran under two hours each to level II, and which point refining waste dropped to zero. At the end of this my yield, with the better faction, ended up being a little more than 2% better.
Go me! Every little bit counts!
This change of roles also reduces some travel time. I leave my miner in whatever system I am working in currently and let Wil do the travelling when the time comes. I suppose that I do not even have to put my miner into dock, but I do anyway out of habit and paranoia.
Finally, it frees me up from one issue that has been bugging me, and that is the transfer of goods between players. I only know of two simple ways to transfer goods between my characters. The first is in space via a jet can. The second is via the corp hangers in our HQ. Since I do not plan to stay within two jumps of our HQ forever, and since space has its share of can thieves, I thought it might be better to consolidate hauling, refining, selling, and possibly production into a single character.
The Ancient Gaming Noob 
I’m pretty sure you can use simple contracts to transfer goods between players as well. Your char with the items makes a specific contract for your other character to give them X items. It can be a totally lopsided contract that doesn’t require any money or anything else and once it is accepted, you can pick up the goods on the station where you left them. I’m pretty sure this works for just about anything – I’m a relative Eve noob so I might totally wrong.
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Two other ways to trade goods between characters: contracts and trades.
Contracts are handy because the characters can be in different corps, they can be in different regions, and the recipient does not even have to be online, he can pick it up when he gets back on. Only downside is the 10K isk cost.
Trades are more simple. If both characters are in a station, look at the Guests tab of the station and rightclick the character and choose Trade. A trade window pops up and both characters can exchange things. Does not require any money or corp hangers, but requires both players logged on and in the same station.
Cheers!
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I knew about contracts, but discounted them. It is a bit of a pain to get them filled out and they cost money. Not bad for an occasional transfer, but if I am shifting several loads of ore daily, money and time can add up quickly.
Trades, though, are new to me. That might fill my transactional needs.
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Trading is probably the way to go on this. Contracts are great, but like Kirith Kodachi said, 10K ISK is a real downside.
I completely understand your interest in getting a better yield. I fret over every lost Trit. So much in fact, that I don’t refine my stuff anymore, I ask a corp mate who has great standing to do it for me. No taxes means alot more minerals :)
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you can’t be making so little that 10k isk is a big deal every time you toss another contract. That’s like one frigate kill. :) But yeah, trades are easy enough, just have to have both in station. Contracts also can’t put up damaged items, so that can be annoying if moving war-torn drones around or t2/faction laser crystals.
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What about a giant secure can that is anchored in 0.7 space? Trades through the station sound good though, didn’t know about about doing it that way. Thanks, Kirith.
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Oh, and grats on finishing up all those refining skills. Where do you usually mine?
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