“If you’re doing this to strike it rich quick, forget it. Those are fairy tales. You wanna mine credits out of this rock, you better be willing to put blood, sweat and tears into it first.”
– Lonnie “Three Hand” Pardino’s Guide to Mining Alone
Another Concept Sale, another Question & Answer session. Since Friday, we’ve been collecting questions from the dedicated Q&A post here and today our designers and artists working on the ship will answer 13 questions for the community. Tune back in on this Friday to see the answers to 14 more questions.
The Prospector and its precision mining capabilities make it an ideal candidate for covert jaunts into dangerous space for the extraction of small quantities of highly dispersed and valuable commodities. We are very excited to discuss this unique ship in more detail, so let’s jump right in!
Special thanks to John Crewe, Phil Meller, Paul Jones, Luke Davis, Todd Papy, and Jonathan Jacevicius for taking the time to answer these questions for us.
The RMAP system on the Orion is manned by the scan operator, who is able to use it to provide precise information. As the Prospector is only manned by one miner, we wanted to put more focus on searching with the ships scanning system. So instead the Prospector will be using the scanners to provide general information in a local space to pinpoint nearby mineral pockets, like a larger, more advanced metal detector.
The Prospector will be much better at pinpointing specific resources and extracting just that type of mineral, targeting pockets directly rather than multiple at once.
Mining equipment will only be able to be equipped on specific hardpoints, as they require other ship equipment to be present for them to operate (pipes, processing equipment and storage tanks), so they will only be on specialized ships.
We can’t go into too much detail yet, only to say that containers can be dropped in space and on planets and then be picked up and stored by other ships.
The Prospector will come equipped with a light jump drive and light quantum drive and as it’s a small ship, it will be able to travel through small jump points too.
Yes they are, the aim is to have all containers compatible with this system. The Prospector and Hull series ships make a very good team! The Prospector is able to keep mining and dumping cargo pods for some time before heading back to a station, allowing the Hull series to do the transporting.
Unfortunately we don’t have any exact numbers to give you yet. But expect more information on this as we progress mining further!
It will have one light shield generator, enough to protect it out in hazardous mining areas but not from sustained fire.
The Prospector has quite a specialised setup with the processing equipment and collapsible storage crates. These crates adhere to standard cargo measurements, but it isn’t currently planned to be a cargo transport.
That’s all container space including reserve collapsed containers.
As we have several industrial manufacturers, expect to see a few options here for choosing a laser that’s fit for purpose. Some might be better and quicker at boring a hole to the target mineral pocket, or be better at mining lighter/denser minerals.
Technically yes, though it is not designed to cut through shields and ship armour. The high power draw, low damage and the short range of the laser in comparison to other ship weapons means it’s not an effective combat weapon.
The Prospector has been designed to be handled by one person from the pilot seat and has facilities/quarters for that one person only.
Prospecting / Mining
For years, the Prospector has been the universe’s preferred mining vessel for solo operators. Featuring MISC’s sleek design sensibility and a bevy of upgraded high-tech mining tools, the 2947 Prospector perfectly balances form and functionality.
24.0m
15.0m
7.0m
Small
116,477kg
0
156 m/s
994 m/s
1
1
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