Invention. Inefficient.

Once upon a time, T2 Blueprint Original (BPO) were available.  It was well before I started playing Eve.  They were given out as mission rewards and/or loyalty points.  Anyone lucky enough to have them will probably never give them up.  The only way I know how to obtain T2 blueprints these days is through invention.  Where you take a T1 blueprint copy (make sure it is a MAX RUN bpc), some datacores and an data interface to get a chance to get a T2 bpc.  It is by no means "guaranteed" to happen and when you did win the roll of the dice and get one, it is a -4 ME.  That nets out to a 50% waste factor.  Holy shit, that's terrible.  So, I circle back to the T2 BPO's.  Those can be researched like T1 BPO's.  You can get the waste factor to zero!  The owners of those BPOs can under price anyone comfortably.  Luckily, they are pretty rare.  

Now for the inefficientcy part.  With max skills, not using any decrypors (I will explain later), or named modules, your success percentage is around 48-50%.  Sometimes you get 7 out of 11, sometimes you get 2 out of 11.  Over all, over time, you will average about a 50% success rate (with optimal skills).  There are ways to stack the deck in your favor.

There are two other options during the invention process.  The use of decryptors (they will affect success percentage, quantities of runs on output BPC and the ME/PE of the output BPC.  You can also use named modules Meta 1-4.  Using modules only increases the success chance, not ME/PE or run counts.  These can be very effective when inventing on a budget.  You can get away with using less datacores (which can get pretty spendy).  I believe you can (and it is so according to Eve ISK/Hour) that you can stack the decryptor and meta success rates.  Theoretically, you can get a 100% success rate.  It would be very expensive though.  You cannot use meta modules when inventing T2 ships however.  Below is a little graph that shows the success rates of the various decryptors and meta modules.  I used a 200mm AC II bpc in ISK/Hr and got these results.

(click to view)

That is about as deep as I want to go with this blog.  More will follow with more details.  Don't just go out and buy decryptors.  You need to choice carefully.  Some items (like large ships) make sense to use decryptors to lower get a better ME level and more runs.  In the long run, this will make your profit margins higher.  Don't overspend on a decryptor though.  

Stay tuned for more on BP research in future blogs.  

As always, fly safe-ish.