Longpost: A detailed discussion of my personal financial plan, past and present

(seriously, you don't want to read this.
The nobody cares tag exists for a reason)

Eve is playable with widely variable amounts of in-game wealth. I've speculated that players could be stratified into different wealth classes, but the idea never really goes anywhere because it's boring. At the extremes though, there are people get excited when a kill drops T2 loot because it means they can now afford to replace their rifter; and on the other end there are the super rich, people with trillions of isk in their wallet who will never have to worry about being able to replace their ship, even if that ship is a titan.

A discussion about people's attitudes toward isk-making would probably be more interesting, where they fall somewhere on a spectrum between those who only make isk so they can afford their next pvp ship and the hardcore carebears whose only goal is to accrue ever-increasing amounts of isk. I don't know very many people though, so this won't be the subject of a future post either.

Anyway.

Personally I'm about two steps below the super rich on the first measure and pretty far toward the carebear end of the spectrum on the other. There is a critical difference between me and the hardcore carebears though, which is that I consider isk a means rather than an end. I want to fly expensive ships, and isk lets me do that.

(of course, then I need to be able to afford to replace that expensive ship...)

One year ago I had accrued 13 billion isk in cash and was planning to get a supercarrier, stop carebearing and have some fun; after all, I would never be able to afford a titan or anything. Things changed, though: Flying a supercarrier stopped being practical (temporarily); I invested my excess isk in capital blueprints in order to turn money into even more money; my earning potential increased; and nyx BPC prices went through the roof.

The ridiculous prices nyx bpc were pulling made it possible to make money, real money, copying blueprints and I decided to invest further in this area. Affording a nyx BPO takes a fair amount of work though, so I resolved to stop as soon as I had enough blueprint income to afford everything I would ever want. The number that I arrived at was 4 billion isk per month, and I started carebearing intensively toward this goal.

Four billion isk per month is a lot of money. Invest the first 40 billion in two more supercarrier BPC, to sell when you need to replace a titan, and you're home free. You can buy all the plex you need to play eve for free forever and have enough left over that you'll never have to fly anything but T3 ships and machariels.

Six months ago, earning 4 billion per month from blueprint copying would have required four nyx plus a few carrier or freighter blueprints. This would have been doable, running around 80 billion isk -- about equal to my total assets today.

Unfortunately for me, nyx BPC prices have fallen significantly and today this would require eight nyx BPO. Trying to earn that sort of isk is not practical for me in the medium term, and I suspect BPC prices will continue to fall as everybody able to build supercapitals buys and researches their own BPO for manufacturing.

My plan for retiring on blueprint income is no longer practical, so it's time for a new plan.

Thusly:

1. Income. I will continue to earn isk the old fashioned way. Since there is no longer a finish line, this will happen at a somewhat more relaxed pace.
2. Expenses. Instead of rushing to get nyx BPO isk will be used to buy whatever is needed, with an emphasis on fun. Machariels will be avoided because they are not cost effective, but T3 are in.
3. Blueprints. Spare isk will still be invested in blueprints. Since supercarriers no longer have a significantly higher MMPB (monthly income, in millions, per billion isk invested) compared to carriers I would start by filling my research slots with carriers, then trading up to blueprints with a higher monthly income though possibly lower MMPB. This goes: Carrier (31m/mo, 32 MMPB), rorqual (76m/mo, 23 MMPB), supercarrier (584m/mo, 35 MMPB (decreasing)), titan (1180m/mo, 18 MMPB).
4. Supercapitals come first. Blueprints are to be liquidated as necessary in order to buy or replace supers. Everything else is cheap and can be covered by normal income, passive income or even petty cash from bounties.