I just went scrounging around for one of these threads, and didn't find anything that completely told me what I wanted to know (namely, if I was going to die of old age before finding nitrite veins while mining). Luckily, it didn't take too much effort to find the information myself, in game.
I started doing exploratory shovelfuls of gravel - easily visible in the burnt and forest biomes and found wherever small boulders are found. These shovelfulls will supply stone, sand, and 1 or 2 ore of whatever happens to be in veins relatively close to the surface directly down from the gravel.
In the forest biome, these shovels always gave iron, and occasionally gave lead as well. I have dug several mines down, and have found close-to-the-surface veins of iron and lead, and have also dug down to bedrock and found nearby iron and lead. I have also found iron veins near bedrock without first checking for gravel up above.
I used a similar process in the burnt biome. All my exploratory shovels found was iron and coal at first, and veins were easily found both nearer to the ground, and at bedrock. None of these veins contained any nitrite for me (small sample size of 2 exploratory wells). Finally, I started casting a wider net. One shovelful of gravel gave me a nitrite. I started digging, and relatively close to the surface, found gravel. Dug around the gravel, and immediately found a very large nitrite vein.
Color wise, iron is still the most obvious due to the rusty color. Lead has a strong bluish cast that also makes it easy to spot. Coal isn't quite as obvious - it has a muddy brown look sometimes, a brownish yellow strippy look sometimes, and a black spots a16 look sometimes. Once you are in a vein of it, it's all around you and easy to spot. The nitrite looks bright white, similar to bedrock.
I haven't had any mine collapse issues in a17 240, and I haven't been particularly careful. There seems to be much more stability than in previous a17 builds. I agree with a comment someone else made - the ore nodes are much more bunched together within a vein than they were.
I haven't yet found oil shale, so I don't yet know what it looks like.
Update:
Went to desert biome. Went to the very first boulder spawn I saw. No gravel. Did a few exploratory shovels. Sand and rock with no ore. Said "♥♥♥♥ it" and dug down to bedrock. It was sand all the way down. When I hit bedrock, I started digging horizontally, even though I was nervous about a cave in. Within about 10 meters, ran into shale. It was evident because it was the only thing around me that wasn't rich brown sand. So far, one unexpected large cave in, even after bracing with wood frames.
I started doing exploratory shovelfuls of gravel - easily visible in the burnt and forest biomes and found wherever small boulders are found. These shovelfulls will supply stone, sand, and 1 or 2 ore of whatever happens to be in veins relatively close to the surface directly down from the gravel.
In the forest biome, these shovels always gave iron, and occasionally gave lead as well. I have dug several mines down, and have found close-to-the-surface veins of iron and lead, and have also dug down to bedrock and found nearby iron and lead. I have also found iron veins near bedrock without first checking for gravel up above.
I used a similar process in the burnt biome. All my exploratory shovels found was iron and coal at first, and veins were easily found both nearer to the ground, and at bedrock. None of these veins contained any nitrite for me (small sample size of 2 exploratory wells). Finally, I started casting a wider net. One shovelful of gravel gave me a nitrite. I started digging, and relatively close to the surface, found gravel. Dug around the gravel, and immediately found a very large nitrite vein.
Color wise, iron is still the most obvious due to the rusty color. Lead has a strong bluish cast that also makes it easy to spot. Coal isn't quite as obvious - it has a muddy brown look sometimes, a brownish yellow strippy look sometimes, and a black spots a16 look sometimes. Once you are in a vein of it, it's all around you and easy to spot. The nitrite looks bright white, similar to bedrock.
I haven't had any mine collapse issues in a17 240, and I haven't been particularly careful. There seems to be much more stability than in previous a17 builds. I agree with a comment someone else made - the ore nodes are much more bunched together within a vein than they were.
I haven't yet found oil shale, so I don't yet know what it looks like.
Update:
Went to desert biome. Went to the very first boulder spawn I saw. No gravel. Did a few exploratory shovels. Sand and rock with no ore. Said "♥♥♥♥ it" and dug down to bedrock. It was sand all the way down. When I hit bedrock, I started digging horizontally, even though I was nervous about a cave in. Within about 10 meters, ran into shale. It was evident because it was the only thing around me that wasn't rich brown sand. So far, one unexpected large cave in, even after bracing with wood frames.
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