Creating an Alt Hauler

This page will present an overview on how to most efficiently create an alternate character (usually on a second account) for hauling most efficiently. This can be considered a current, text version of the Alt Hauling 101 audio class.

Overview

Our goal is to be able to haul the most amount of stuff (measured in m^3) in the least amount of time from a new character's perspective. In doing this task, EVEMon is your friend, and this guide basically shows you some career paths that you can then customize.

The route you take depends on the race of the character, as all characters now (1/1/2010) start with minimal skills but those include racial frigate skills. The best route to take is to create an Amarr character to fly the Amarr Bestower, which can haul over 13,000 m^3 with a minimally trained set of skills!

Note: You cannot train these skills (Racial Industrial) on Trial accounts.

Creating a Bestower Pilot

Create an Amarr Character

The first step, of course, is to create your new character. Lets begin there. After logging in, you will be presented with the character select window. This has three squares of your character; the most recently played one will be on top in a big portrait window, and the others will be below in smaller squares. These may be blank squares that are barely visible, but they will say "Empty" below them in text. Click one of these Empty squares and you will be taken to the character creator.

Choose Race

Obviously, since we want to fly the Amarr Bestower most quickly, we'll create an Amarr character, so at the "Choose Race" screen, select Amarr, the top right option. This is the only option that makes any difference from a gameplay perspective, as it affects your starting racial skills (namely, your racial Frigate skill).

Complete Creation

Next, you'll have the ability to chose your bloodline and ancestry. These do not make any difference to the stats you will start with, but they will change your starting appearance and (I believe; this should be verified) the location your character starts.

Then, you'll choose your gender, which again makes no gameplay difference, and then you'll have an opportunity to set up your appearance and select your name. There is also a very small option that lets you start in space instead of a station, but let's just start in a station.

You'll hit "Create Character" and then be taken back to the character selection screen. Note, you have to wait at least 24 hours before you can delete your new character!

Pause Training

If you are creating an alt on an account with other characters, only one character can be training skills at a time. Attempting to add skills to the training queue will result in an error, so let's first go into all our other characters (if any) and pause training:

• Open Character Sheet (top left button)
• Skills section (on the left, should be default)
• Skills tab (on the right, should be default)
• Open Training Queue button (new window pops up)
• Pause (bottom middle of the new window)

Now, we're ready to train the alt.

Send Money

Now, your new avatar will start out flat broke. She'll need to buy these skills:

• Amarr Industrial (270,000)
• Hull Upgrades (54,000)

for a total of 334,000 ISK. They can in all likelihood be purchased in the starting station, so there's no need to travel.

You'll also want to buy a Bestower (best price in Amarr as of this writing is around 550,000 ISK, but 950,000 at the newbie station) as well as a shuttle to get to the Bestower (Around 15,000 for one actually at your station, or shop around for maybe 8,000 or so).

Then, you'll want four Expanded Cargohold II modules (about 650,000 each).

Grant total: About 3.5 million ISK (3,500,000). So, log in your main, find your alt in the People & Places window, under the Buddies tab, search for the character name and add to your addressbook. Then, right-click her portrait and Send Money to her.

If you complete the tutorial missions for industry, you will get a free Sigil (the smaller Amarr industrial), so go ahead and do that if you desire. That will make your training time longer, as I believe some missions require training other skills to complete them. However, this option might be worthwhile for a quicker start if you are short on ISK.

Train for Bestower

You will be flying the Bestower in under 12 hours (half a day) if you go this route!

Start Training Quickly

The first thing you're going to want to do is start training Amarr Frigate III as soon as you can when you log in. Do this:

• Open Character Sheet (top left button)
• Skills section (on the left, should be default)
• Skills tab (on the right, should be default)
• Open Training Queue button (new window pops up)
• Open the Spaceship Command skills (bottom of the left side)
• Highlight Amarr Frigate by clicking it
• Click Add at the bottom
• Click Apply at the bottom

Now you will show Amarr Frigate in the left side, counting down from 9h 8m 47s. You have a little time to relax now and do the rest at a more leisurely pace.

Go ahead and close the Character Sheet window but leave the Training Queue window open for now.

It's a good idea not to waste training time, so since you paused your other character's training, you want to get started learning as fast as possible.

Skills Required

You will need to learn these skills to fly the Bestower:

• Amarr Frigate III
• Amarr Industrial I (depends on the above)
• Hull Upgrades II

Since we can't even put the Industrial skill into the queue until we have learned Frigate III, plan to set a timer approximately 9h 8m from now to come back and add that to the training queue.

Remaining Training

Now that Frigate III is training, let's purchase Hull Upgrades and add it to the queue.

• Open the Market window
• Click the Search tab on the top left
• Type "Hull Upgrades" into the text box and click the Search button
• Select the Hull Upgrades that shows up below the Search button by clicking it
• Click the Jumps column header under Sellers to the right so it has a triangle pointing up (▲ - this will only display if you have a good Unicode font)

There should now be a row starting Station with the skill book for sale for 54,000.00 ISK at your current location, with an expiration in 364d and change. Right click that row and choose Buy This. Verify the information in the window that pops up, and click Buy. Now you have your next skill to add to the queue. Close the Market window.

Open your station items by clicking the Items button on the left of the screen. In there, you'll see a book labeled Hull Upgrades. Right-click this and select Inject Skill. Now, that skill will be in your Training Queue window under the Mechanic skills.

So, go back to your Training Queue window, find the Hull Upgrades skill, and click Add twice on it to train it to level II. In total, these two things will take just under two hours.

Now, because it's a bad idea to leave your queue less than full (in case something comes up in real life), pick other skills and fill out your queue (using the Add button). Preferably, add a long skill to the very end, and as many short skills before then. Your longest training skill now will be Frigate IV, but you might also wish to learn Spaceship Command III.

While we're waiting, let's purchase the Amarr Industrial skill book in the same manner as you did the Hull Upgrades book above, so we have it when we need it. Only do this if you're planning to stay at the same station, and do not transport the book. Skill books are safest in a dock and in your head, so I recommend not to make a habit of traveling around with them if you want to learn them (using them as trade items is another story).

Amarr Industrial

So, you now have a two hour window between the end of training Frigate IV and the end of your Hull Upgrades requirements. Plan to be back at the computer during this window (some 9 to 11 hours from now).

At this point, right-click the skill book in your Items list, and select Train now to level 1, and say "OK" to any pop-up window. If that is not an option, do this instead:

• Right-click and choose Inject Skill
• In your Training Queue window, it should now show up under Spaceship Command. Drag it from there to the top of the queue to the right, so it trains first.
• Click the Apply button

This skill will train in just over 40 minutes.

Conclusion

Now, after under 12 hours, you will have a fully trained Bestower pilot. All you need now is a fitted Bestower and something to do with it. That's up to you!

Get and Fit your Bestower

(This is a little bit beyond the scope of this document, but here's a summary.)

• Open your Market window
• Search for a reasonably priced Bestower nearby by clicking the Price column header to sort it descending (upward pointing triangle, ▲)
• Note the location of the Bestower you'd like to buy - don't buy it yet
• Search again for Expanded Cargohold II for a good price (this will probably be in Amarr, the local trade hub)
• Decide where you want to buy each of these knowing you will have to travel to both places in either a shuttle (if you buy one) or your Impairor
• Purchase both
• Fly to your Bestower and get into it
• Fly to your Expanded Cargohold IIs and fit them into your Bestower
• Start hauling 13,319 m^3 wherever you want!

Optimize with Giant Secure Containers

There are items called Giant Secure Containers (called a GSC) which take up 3,000 m^3 in your cargo hold. Hence, you can fit four of these in your bestower.

The interesting thing is that you can actually put 3,900 m^3 of stuff in a GSC - which means you get a 30% space bonus. Hence, using four of these gets you 3,600 m^3 extra space, as long as nothing you are hauling can't fit in one.

That brings your Bestower total close to 17,000 m^3.

Note: To use these, you do not need to train the skill Anchoring, unless you plan to place ("anchor") them in space. This skill has no prerequisites but is a 3x skill, so it will probably take about half an hour to train if you do plan to anchor your GSCs. However not having them anchored (in space) will enable other people to flip the can and even scoop the entire GSC to their cargo hold.

Other Racial Haulers

The Bestower is the fastest return for the most space. However, other races (well, except the Caldari like me) have decent hauling capability depending on the training investment. The Mammoth is often considered the best hauler for a week of training, giving almost half again the Bestower's space (with Expanded Cargohold IIs).

All stats include a maximum number of these Expanded Cargohold IIs.

Mammoth Pilot (Minmatar)

If you're willing to wait a week to haul almost 18,000 m^3 instead of half a day to haul just over 13,000 m^3, then consider training a Mammoth pilot instead.

You'll need these skills:

• Minmatar Frigate III
• Minmatar Industrial IV
• Hull Upgrades II

Iteron Pilot (Gallente)

For the investment of a month training, an Iteron Mark V pilot will haul over 25,000 m^3. Here's how to do that.

You'll need these skills:

• Gallente Frigate III
• Gallente Industrial V (~24 days from IV with a new character)
• Hull Upgrades II

Badger Pilot (Caldari)

Finally, if you desire to fly a Caldari Badger Mark II, capable of hauling just over 12,500 m^3, here's how you can do this. This is most useful for Caldari pilots who already have the Frigate and Hull Upgrade skills and want to be flying in under two hours.

You'll need these skills:

• Caldari Frigate III
• Caldari Industrial II
• Hull Upgrades II

Reference

Haulable amounts (in m^3) with minimal skills and full Expanded Cargohold IIs:

Ship	Cargo m^3	Race
Bestower	13,319	Amarr
Mammoth	17,838	Minmatar
Iteron Mark IV	13,058	Gallente
Iteron Mark V	25,270	Gallente
Badger	7,041	Caldari
Badger Mark II	12,514	Caldari

Credits

Raddick Tseng for suggesting this, and giving some interesting statistics.