E2150 - Mining

This article shows mining data for all factions in different setups. As much as ED and LC doesn't have much choice (there are actually 1 and 2 options respectively), there are plenty of options for UCS, and even small details can matter there. The following article will go through all of them.

ED

In case of ED, mining speed is constant. The optimal setup of mines and refineries for any 3x3 resource field is with all buildings pointing inwards towards the center, however it is possible to place the mines outwards at the cost of mining speed. Placing the mines outwards is a very dubious solution. The pros could include mining all resources at equal tempo (in H/X shaped resource fields, western mines go out of resources a bit earlier), having mine weapons pointed outwards by default (thus perhaps making them more efficient at defending) or making the builder unable to get trapped inside. The cons are more significant though - the mining speed drops by some ~1,7% (taiga needs to travel by 1 square to the refinery and then return, what makes it late by a tick or two to receive the next container, setting up takes more time (as the builder needs to travel a lot) and despite having the guns placed outwards, the working taigas are more exposed, making an easier target - so defensively inwards is probably better anyway. Just for the sake of making an in-depth analysis, we will present results for both options

CRs mined by ED (4 mines, 2 refs) in the time of 20 minutes
Mines placement variant	Resources mined in 20 minutes
Inwards	133 660
Outwards	131 910

LC

Similarly to ED, LC has just 2 options - going standard mines, or upgraded mines. As much as upgraded mines clearly mine faster, going standard mines makes sense in certain builds, although it is a strategical decision.

CRs mined by LC (4 mines) in 20 minutes
Mine building variant	Resources mined in 20 minutes
Upgraded	116 500
Standard	107 000

The data above means that upg mine mines faster by some 8,9%, however in upg mines were just about to consume some containers at this point, and the actual value is closer to ~9,6%.

It is also worth mentioning, that it doesn't make any difference whether you place mines on the corners, or more grouped, or whatever - any variant of 4 mines placed on a resource field performs exactly the same.

UCS

In case of UCS it gets very complicated, as there are many variables that affect the mining speed. First of all, UCS has 3 different harvester types that have different mining speed. As UCS you can place 2 or 3 refineries for each resource field (ofc you can place just 1 or more than 3 but it doesn't make sense). What is more, you can place refineries in various ways - you can palce both of them on 1 side, you can also place each on the opposite sides of the resource fields etc. And that's still not the end of the possibilities, as you can space refineries by 1 square from the resource fields, or you can space them by 2 tiles.

Refinery placement

Usually it is best to place just 2 refineries (although there are scenarios, where placing 3 refineries is a valid option - you should take into consideration the fact that it costs more money to set up such facility, as this means that you will most likely want more harvesters as well). Refineries that are spaced 2 tiles away from the resource field perform better than refineries placed just 1 square (as most players do) from the resource field. The reason for the latter underperforming is, that sometimes (especially with more harvesters around), the refinery pickup spot can be just next to a mining dot (sometimes even 3 dots). If the refinery is currently occupied by harvester, then any of the harvesters that are mining just next to the refinery pickup spot will stay on the "dot" and wait till the refinery pickup spot gets free. In the variant with 2 tiles spacing, they move by 1 square towards the refinery, freeing the mining dot for other harvesters. It doesn't make any difference whether you place refineries on the opposite sides of the resource field, or both on the same side. Since it is better to have the buildings more grouped (to ensure more reliable energy coverage and to make the defense easier against rushing LC), it could be slightly better to place them on the same side if possible. It is also important to not place any other structure next to resource fields, to leave some space for the harvesters to navigate around.

Different refinery spacing (2 refs, 2x5 T2 harvesters)
Refinery distance from the resource field	Resources mined in 20 minutes
2 tiles	170 760 (+4,4% vs 1 tile)
1 tile	163 490
0 tiles	135 785 (-17,5% vs 1 tile)

Number and type of harvesters

You can use different amount and type of harvesters. Generally using T1 harvesters is not an option and the first UCS research is virtually always T2 harvester. It is also very important to assign harvesters manually and evenly to the refineries.

Comparison of mining performance on H shaped resource field
Number of refineries	Number of Harvesters	Harvester type	CRs mined in 20 minutes
3	5	III	203 175
3	6	III	201 715
3	4	III	199 660
3	7	III	197 525
3	5	II	190 350
3	6	II	189 000
3	7	II	188 325
3	4	II	188 295
3	3	III	184 675
3	3	II	175 560
2	5	III	174 560
2	6	III	173 425
2	5	II	171 000
2	7	III	170 805
2	6	II	170 610
2	4	III	167 980
2	7	II	166 680
2	4	II	160 220
3	5	I	143 790
3	6	I	142 030
3	4	I	141 635
2	7	I	140 500
2	6	I	139 845
3	7	I	139 505
2	3	III	136 945
2	5	I	133 880
2	3	II	131 705
3	3	I	131 500
2	4	I	123 560
2	3	I	103 000

Going 6 or more harvesters for each refinery is actually slowing the mining down due to units starting to obstruct each other more and more. Generally best options are 3refs and 3x4 harvesters, or 2 refs and 2x5 harvesters. Only T2 and T3 harvesters should be considered as an option.

Logged data

You can manually browse all the data captured and used for creating this article, using Earth stats viewer along with data files