OGame Miner Guide 2026

The Miner Playstyle: Economy as a Weapon

In OGame there are three paths to success: fleet, expeditions or economy. The miner — known in OGame as the Collector class — chooses the economic path. Instead of winning in battles, the miner achieves their advantage through sheer resource superiority: more metal, more crystal, more deuterium than any other player in their league.

This is not a passive playstyle. A good miner optimises continuously: Which mines on which planet? When is the next plasma technology level worth it? How do I distribute crawlers optimally? These questions require strategic thinking — only the battlefront is different.

The Collector Class: Bonuses Overview

The Collector class is the official OGame class for the miner playstyle. Choose it at the start or switch later. The class gives you the following permanent bonuses:

• +25% resource production on all planets (mines, fusion reactor, crawlers)
• +10% energy production from solar plant and fusion reactor
• Increased crawler limit: You can operate more crawlers per planet than other classes
• Bonus crawlers: Automatically one additional crawler with certain officer combinations

The 25% production bonus sounds simple, but is enormous in practice — it equals several additional mine levels on every planet, without build time and without resource costs.

Plasma Technology: The Most Important Miner Research

Plasma technology is the key research for every miner. Each level of plasma technology gives:

• +1% metal production on all planets
• +0.66% crystal production on all planets
• +0.33% deuterium production on all planets

The effect applies to every planet in your empire simultaneously. With 9 planets, the profit multiplies accordingly. Plasma technology level 30 means 30% more metal, 20% more crystal and 10% more deuterium — on all planets.

When is the next plasma technology level worth it?

The costs for plasma technology grow exponentially. Calculate the break-even: divide the research costs by the daily additional yield. From level 10–12 onwards, the waiting times become noticeably longer — many experienced miners build plasma technology in parallel with the mines and skip no levels.

Crawlers: Mobile Production Boosters

Crawlers are units of the Collector class that are stationed on a planet and increase its resource production. They are not combat units — their strength lies in the permanent production bonus.

Important: Crawlers can be attacked and destroyed. A miner must protect their crawlers — either through sufficient defence or by hiding them on a moon. Many experienced miners only build crawlers en masse once the defence is in place.

Using crawlers efficiently

• Distribute crawlers evenly across all planets for maximum total output
• Give highest crawler priority to planets with the highest mine levels
• Sufficient defence on every planet as basic protection
• Collector class increases the crawler limit per planet — make full use of this

Resource Distribution: Which Mine for Which Planet?

Not every planet produces equally efficiently. The position in the solar system influences the basic production of the deuterium synthesiser — cold planets (positions 1–3) produce more deuterium, warm planets (positions 7–9) less. Conversely, all positions have equal metal and crystal base values.

Strategically sensible: Place particularly high deuterium synthesisers on cold planets and compensate for metal and crystal on other planets. A balanced overall portfolio is better than a planet optimised for one resource.

Miner Playstyle: Strengths and Challenges

As a miner you are economically dominant, but militarily weaker. Your strengths: You can sell resources to other players, support alliances logistically and afford expensive research and ships earlier than combat-oriented players.

The challenge: You are an attractive target. Those who produce many resources attract raiders. The answer: Either build strong defence, join a strong alliance — or both. Resources that are invested in buildings cannot be stolen. Build consistently instead of hoarding.