From Assembly Line to Hanger

[TL;DR - I got a Sleipnir]

Far East Movement - Rocketeer ft. Ryan Tedder

The other day, Sugar finished Warfare Link Specialist IV. It was the last skill that she needed to plug in Command Ships and access the Sleipnir. All the time and prep and planning has passed. I now need to get off of some ISK and buy one. Since I have worked so hard towards the goal (I am crediting patience and focus as work here) it is only right that I get off of the ISK to buy her the tool that she needs.

But, because I still hate spending ISK I decided to do some price comparisons. I could buy the Sleipnir or I could build it. Then I could write about it in an inexpert manner. It sounded good to me.

What is a Ship?

It is easy to think of ship cost in a very simple fashion of ship = ISK. But, when I buy that ship off the market the game is not spawnithat timeand birthing it wet andslippery into my hanger. Someone gathered the materials, researched or purchased the blue prints, had skills learned, and built the ship. They then flew or hauled the ship to the market where it was put up for sale. To get starry eyed and think, this ship could have been in battle and see incredible things before it passed into my hands. Maybe it has lain for years, neglected in someone's hanger. I don't know what its past was but I do know that at least one other person has participated in its construction.

I find that type of thing to be a bit romantic I guess.

But it's fun.

Making the buy

First, I looked at prices. There were some Sleipnir's available in low sec for 293 mil. No thanks. Jita price is at 300-305mil. Okay, I can work with this. Jita becomes my baseline price for what I will pay.

I then looked at Rens. 348mil. Is almost 50 mil worth the convince of having it at the trade hub that we jump freighter from? Well, only Sugar can fly the ship and her sec status bars her from high sec. Jita is 30+ jumps away from my home system. But I have another option. An option that makes Eve a beautiful thing.

I can pay Red Frog Freight to transport my Sleipnir to Rens for 12mil isk and then have it jumped down next jump freighter run. I could take a large enough iteron up there myself and cart it to Rens or even Scout it into low sec. However, 30 some jumps in a large iteron for one ship.. thinking about it causes me pain. So, Red Frog from Jita to Rens it is.

Now, the next question is can I build one for cheaper?

What cost to build yon t2?

The first thing I realized was that I could not build one at all. I need a character with ship building skills learned. I now know what my market/mining/indy alt is going to start working on next. My entire plan is kind of blown out of the water, but for the sake of my own curiosity for building a T2 ship, I'll continue to price it out.

To build a Sleipnir I will need a Sleipnir Blue Print Copy. On contracts that costs: 25 million ISK

The materials needed according to the blue print are are:

Cyclone (the ship): 1 unit - 30mil ISK
Morphite: 350 units - 1.8mil ISK
Deflection Shield Emitter: 665 units - 3.9mil ISK
Electrolytic Capacitor Unit: 1,138 units - 59.7mil ISK
Fernite Carbide Composite Armor Plate: 19,125 units - 168mil ISK
Ladar Sensor Unit: 525 units - 12mil ISK
Nanomechanical Microprocessor: 2100 units - 80mil ISK
Necular Reactor Unit: 70 units - 2.4mil ISK
Plasma Thruster: 140 units - 4mil ISK
Construction Blocks: 350 units - 2.1mil ISK

Total: 388mil for me to buy the parts I need to build it with no skills. Then I would still have to get all of the parts to a location where I could build it. That would mean paying for transport.

Now, this is construction with base skills. I believe that the people building them for profit have taken the time to learn perfect skills. They may manufacture and create many of the pieces themselves. Their investment is time and their ISK comes from combining that time into a ship to create a profit. However, this is a snapshot of a 'regular' combat focused character and the choices that they can make. It also shows why industry is its own career path. Learning Cruiser Construction to V would be the same skill path are learning medium guns to V time wise.

Beyond the Cyclone and Morphite I had no idea what the rest of the stuff was. This is why someone who specializes in industry doesn't have the time to specialize in pewpew. The gun/missile skill trees are enormous and skill intensive. Sugar is about to start on large guns after command ship 5 finishes. I learned that the eve wiki does not have as much information as I would like. Some of the stuff comes from blue prints on the market and some come from Planetary Interaction.

I could break it down beyond this but I'm not going to because that's a lot of stuff and I'm lazy at times.

I purchased my Sleipnir from Jita at 299mil ISK. I then contracted it to Red Frog for 12mil ISK. It will be jumped down sometime this week by the corporation. It took less than 24 hours for the contract to be accepted and completed and the ship delivered to Rens.

Actually Flying the Sleipnir

I can factor in other costs if I want to as well. If I was a business it would matter. Or, if I was comparing it to schooling it would make sense. I needed to buy two skill books to fly the Sleipnir. Command ships is the major 'needed' book. Just as I had to buy 'Logistics' to get into my Oni and Scimi. However, one of the prerequisites is Heavy Assault Cruisers.

Most (but not all) skill books are seeded onto the market by NPC sell orders. Command ships runs at 57.6mil ISK. It is a onetime purchase but it still sucks. Heavy Assault Cruisers, which I only purchased to learn this ship cost 28.8mil ISK.

In Eve, as always, one must not look at one thing but everything when trying to achieve a goal such as a particular ship. Note that the Command Ship Skill Book has one set of requirements.

However, the actual ship that I would be flying it in has a different set.

And thus the path to said ship is not straight or narrow. It is not gain level receive spaceship. It is very easy to train into a skill book only to discover that the spaceship itself has more requirements and another 2 or more weeks until it can be flown.

Sugar will be taking command ships all the way to 5. The bonuses on the Sleipnir are:

Battlecruiser Skill Bonus: 5% bonus to Medium Projectile Turret rate of fire and 7.5% bonus to Shield Booster effectiveness per level

Command Ships Skill Bonus: 5% bonus to Medium Projectile Turret damage and 10% bonus to Medium Projectile Turret falloff per level

Role Bonus: 99% reduction in Warfare Link module CPU need

I won't be doing leadership stuff for a good long time yet. I've been pondering Fleet Commanders of late and why people want to rush into it first thing. I can't see myself FCing a fleet now, much less back when I was two months old.

But I am hopeful for my new Carebear Boat. Hopefully no one takes the flashy red sec status and stuff seriously. Pewpew! Death to red crosses.