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New Eden Archive · Expansions · Mining

Mining - what changed across expansions

Chronological summary of the top changes for Mining pilots across 4 expansions, from Kronos (June 2014) onwards. Click an expansion title for the full deep-dive.

  1. Crius - Industry Overhaul

    4 changes
    1. 4

      Reprocessing math was completely rewritten - maximum NPC-station efficiency dropped from 100% to 72.4%, but mineral yields per unit of ore rose ~38% across the board to compensate; the practical effect was a hard nudge toward player-owned reprocessing arrays for serious miners.

    2. 3

      All ores and ices unified to require 100 units per reprocessing batch (previously varied per ore); reprocessing math became uniform and finally predictable for casual miners doing the "right click -> reprocess" flow.

    3. 3

      POS Reprocessing Arrays got a Compression Array companion, letting POS operators compress ore directly out of cargo with a right-click; compressed ore volumes shrank dramatically without changing mineral output, transforming nullsec ore-export logistics.

    4. 2

      Faction-warfare upgrades shifted from giving station industry slots to providing -10%-per-level NPC industry cost reduction (max 4 levels = 40% off), tying mining/industry incentives to factional warfare participation in a new way.

  2. Lifeblood - Active Moon Mining

    4 changes
    1. 5

      Moon mining became a mining playstyle for the first time - the active drilling extraction creates an asteroid-belt-style ore field that fleets actually mine, integrating moon goo extraction into the same gameplay loop as ore mining and ending the "passive moons mean nullsec sov holders win for free" economic model.

    2. 4

      Resource Wars introduced 5 difficulty tiers of empire-faction mining expedition sites in highsec - players join their empire's resource gathering with NPC pirate combat, creating a new highsec PvE/mining hybrid loop with LP rewards.

    3. 3

      Athanor and Tatara refineries got bonused reprocessing yields, beating the post-Crius NPC station cap; for nullsec miners, post-Lifeblood reprocessing happens at an Athanor or Tatara, not at the old Citadel reprocessing array.

    4. 2

      Mining frigate / barge balance got minor tuning - Tech 1 frigates / destroyers / cruisers received underperforming-hull buffs alongside the moon mining headline, mostly affecting alpha-tier and casual highsec mining fits.

  3. Equinox - Sovereignty Rework

    3 changes
    1. 4

      Metenox Moon Drill added passive moon mining as a deployable structure in lowsec / null / wormhole space - for the first time since Lifeblood (2017) killed POS-passive moons, alliances and small groups can run a moon as a passive income source instead of an active drilling op.

    2. 4

      Magmatic Gas (highsec gas-cloud mining) and Superionic Ice (nullsec ice mining) became valuable mining targets driven by Sov-Hub Reagent demand - high-volume new mining commodities tied directly to whether a system's upgrades are funded.

    3. 4

      Mining anomaly and ore-distribution changes broke the pre-2024 ratting/mining anomaly equilibrium - early Equinox mining was widely panned for breaking yields into small rocks; CCP iterated heavily and posted a "philosophy and learnings" devblog acknowledging the misstep, with a post-launch ore-anomaly rebalance landing within months.

      caveat

      The "small rocks" complaint was the biggest reception scar on Equinox; the version live in 2026 is the post-iteration Equinox, not the launch one.

  4. Catalyst - Mining and Industry Expansion

    4 changes
    1. 4

      Pioneer mining destroyer entered service as the first mining destroyer - a frigate/barge midpoint that's Alpha-clone-flyable and Omega-upgradeable, three variants, designed as the new-player on-ramp into mining.

    2. 4

      Kernite and Omber were added back to high-sec mining anomalies for level-3 / level-4 storyline trade missions - closes a long-standing "why can't I find Kernite anywhere" returning-player friction point.

    3. 3

      In-space UI overlays for mining (rock health, cycle progress, critical-hit feedback) shipped - the actual moment-to-moment experience of mining looks different in-client, the first significant mining-UX update in years.

    4. 4

      **Hyperspace fractures + phased asteroid fields** - the actual prismaticite gameplay loop. Probe-scanned fields in lowsec/null hold four phased asteroids; deploy a mobile phase anchor (~5M ISK, 10 activations) within 50 km and supply energy from an industrial command ship (1 Rorqual / 2 Orcas / 3 Porpoises) to phase asteroids in to 100% efficiency. Fields last ~40 hours; public reveal at +20 hours; last two asteroids contain the prismaticite jackpot and only activate after public reveal.

Impact score 1-5 (5 = paradigm shift for that playstyle). Numbers in lime are 4-5; blue is 3; grey is 1-2.