Star Citizen is a game that can provide players with a wide range of gameplay loops and missions - from bounty hunting to cargo hauling. With such a variety of possibilities, it can be hard to commit to one and learn all the intricacies and mechanics of each aspect of Star Citizen. Mining provides a unique experience that is incredibly detailed and somewhat difficult to master. This guide will help players to learn the basics and begin making a good profit to buy new ships and items in game.
Best Ships
There are a few options for the player to choose from when it comes to mining ships. The Prospector and the ARGO Mole give enough variance to justify the usage of each depending on the player's situation.
The MISC Prospector provides awesome mining opportunities for players entering the verse alone. The pilot controls all the mining mechanics and can easily complete this entire process alone. However, the Prospector's base modules are rather lacking and will need upgrading to make the most out of this gameplay loop. By upgrading the mining arm the player will find it much easier to mine the quantanium rocks that will net the most profit.
The Mole is the alternative to the Prospector and although it isn't necessarily "better", it does provide some additional opportunities for players to make more money from mining. This ship is made to be operated by multiple crew members. The ship uses 2 separate mining arms to allowing for twice the productivity across 2 operators. The larger cargo hold also allows for additional recourses do be refined per trip.
Best Vehicles
The Greycat ROC (Remote Ore Collector) is a ground vehicle (which operates similarly to the HoverQuad) that can mine and extract ore from rocks, similar to the ships. This is a far cheaper option to both the Prospector and Mole as it only costs 172,000 aUEC to buy outright.
The player will need a ship to store and carry the ROC. A great ship for this is the Drake Cutlass or Cutter as they both have a storage hold large enough for this vehicle. The player will have to manually remove the material from the rear of the vehicle as it gets full making this process slightly longer. Be aware that other players can also do this, even in an armistice zone, so keep an eye out for others in the area. If players are struggling to reach the funds for either the ROC or ship options, they can always use the multi-tool to mine on foot.
On Foot Mining
On foot mining is the final method of gaining materials in Star Citizen. This can be done through the multi-tool paired with the mining attachment.
For those that may not be able to afford the ships or ROC (or those who only have access to a starter ship) this method is a great way of learning the mining mechanics. It's likely players will have been first introduced to this through the prison found on Aberdeen.
Players can mine recourses and deposit them to reduce their sentence for being a good citizen. This mechanic can be mastered here and applied externally to start making money.
How To Mine
The player needs to search for the rocks with orange cracks. These are easy to locate as they stand out from the ordinary rocks. These rocks will contain a higher proportion of quantanium.
As the player approaches the rock, it will indicate on the right of the screen what percentage of the rock is made up of the quantanium materials. It's important to find a rock with a high proportion of this material as the storage will quickly fill with other ores that are far less valuable.
Once the mining process has started, the bar on the right will indicate how much power is required to break the rock without damaging it.
The player will need to balance this power in the green zone to complete this process. Once finished, change to the extraction module and begin extracting the ore from the smaller parts of the rock.
This will begin filling the cargo hold. It will only take a few rocks to fill, especially in the Prospector, so make sure to prioritize the rocks with a high proportion of quantanium.
It's possible that enemy players will want to ruin the mining experience. Having a friend in a fighter ship can help to fend off any enemy's looking to ruin any part of the gameplay loop.
Extraction
Once finished, change to the extraction module and begin extracting the ore from the smaller parts of the rock. This will begin filling the cargo hold. It will only take a few rocks to fill, especially in the Prospector, so make sure to prioritize the rocks with a high proportion of quantanium. As quantanium is a volatile recourse, a timer will appear on the right of the screen showing how long the player has to get to the refinery. If this gets to zero, the player's ship will explode. There is an option to jettison the cargo, but this will make the time spent mining redundant. Luckily, this timer will be around 14 - 15 minutes which is plenty of time to get to a nearby refinery.
The mining gameplay loop was added to the game in Alpha 3.2.0 around 4 years ago in Star Citizen's development. Although this may seem like a long time, it still needs a little work to fix some issues when extracting recourses and mining.
Refining
There are a few locations that have a refinery around the system, so it shouldn't matter where the player has been mining, there will always be one close enough to get the materials offloaded in time. Here's a list of locations that can facilitate the refinement process:
- ARC-L1 Wide Forest Station
- ARC-L2 Lively Pathway Station
- ARC-L4 Faint Glen Station
- CRU-L1 Ambitious Dream Station
- HUR-L1 Green Glade Station
- HUR-L2 Faithful Dream Station
- MIC-L1 Shallow Frontier Station
- MIC-L2 Long Forest Station
Once the player is at a location with a refinery and the ship is stored, the timer will end. Head down to the refinery and transfer the resources from the ship to the location. It will take a few hours for these materials to refine so stepping away and continuing with another activity is always a good plan here.
Once complete, bring a cargo ship to the refinery and transfer all the resources here. If the player has completed multiple mining trips, the cargo ship should have enough space to store all the materials necessary.
Selling The Loot
Finally, the player will need to sell their refined materials at a trading center. These can also be found at a few locations around the system including Loreville, Area18, or New Babbage.
Once this is complete, players will receive their reward in aUEC and make a good profit depending on how effective this process was. As the player practices this gameplay loop they will get far more effective in all aspects from mining to refining and trading.
Star Citizen is available on PC.