PC (SPOILER) A17.1 B9 - Mining - Things... Seem Changed (with screen shots)

J

Jackelmyer

New member
Some things to note:

World Size: 16Kx16K

World Gen: RWG (specifically with A17.1 B9)

I've been on a few threads where more than one person, including myself, felt like underground mining wasn't really what it was in A16 and seemed harder to find certain materials.

I couldn't really take not knowing what has changed or what seems to have changed. So I did what I saw someone else had done and uncommented the visualizations in the blocks.xml config file.

Hopped back into my game, flipped on Debug, flipped on God Mode, and took a spin flying around underground.

Some... Interesting things. And... This is purely desert. So if anyone wants a research project, go for broke on the average behavior of all the biomes.

1st. There's less iron man... Kinda. A16, you'd find iron at bedrock up. Not exactly true in A17. As a matter of fact, I saw no Iron actually in the bottom 10-15 blocks of the map. Other deposits, but not iron.

2nd. Iron is underground, however... It seems that Iron now spawns underground, but on top of other resource veins. You'll see in the screenshots below Oil Shale, and on top of it, are Iron Ore blocks. Basically what this means, is if you are underground mining, and you hit a biome specific vein especially, dig UP. Find the top of it, then dig around the top of the vein. You'll find... some... iron.

3rd. Iron is a near surface ore. It's fairly clear in the screenshots below. Iron is spattered around underground as mentioned in point 2 above. However... Iron has a MUCH greater abundance in the top 30 blocks of terrain in the world.

4th. Nitrate and Coal are almost non-existent in at least the desert. Kinda similar to A16, but IMO it seems much less frequent and much smaller in the amount of these two resources than I'd find in A16.

5th. Lead is just stupid abundant. It's... Everywhere. In the desert area I'm at, at the very least, there is almost as much lead as there is Oil Shale.

My Personal Opinion: I have no idea what TFP was thinking in this type of ore distribution. I don't know why Iron Ore would literally be placed sparingly on top of most biome specific resource veins. But, hey, at least we have a pattern to look for now right? I think TFP kinda moved the slider on Iron and Lead. Increasing the amount of lead you'd find underground, but decreasing the amount of Iron Ore. I also think TFP assumed we'd figure this out. And to couple with the AI changes and digging, the majority of the iron was put within 30 blocks or less of the surface. Which... if I remember the AI discussions correctly, that's the max distance AI will look to find a path to a player. Go fig.

My suggestion to all you underground miners... And what I'll be trying myself. Find a vein of biome specific resource? Dig up. Find the top of it. Then dig around. Seems like the iron is basically set as a flat slab on top of those resource veins. But still... Well below surface.

Best of luck.

NOTE: For some reason the IMG tag doesn't want to work with me. I'll try to get the screen shots up shortly.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/pb42h8n7qtr2um7/oreresearch1.jpg

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6n9udwk6uaen8cz/oreresearch2.jpg?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/opj1tk43x6g4nct/oreresearch3.jpg?dl=0

First Image: Lots of iron within the top 30 blocks of terrain.

5xr5es.jpg


Second Image: Iron Ore sitting on top of an Oil Shale Vein.

2qjvamg.jpg


Third Image: Lots of resource deposits nearer the surface. There are resource deposits underground, but there are bigger gaps between resource veins. I should have taken other screen shots because there are oceans of emptiness underground by bedrock.

50qomo.jpg


 
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Well, that explains why I have the best luck finding everything I need searching at levels 15 thru 20
Click to expand...
yeah. You're most likely rolling on resources. lol. Any digger troubles with wandering hordes?

 
yeah. You're most likely rolling on resources. lol. Any digger troubles with wandering hordes?
Click to expand...
There was one time, but it was where I started digging down. It was a real stupid mistake. I should not have dug straight down without at least some structure defending the hole at the surface.

EDIT: It was a pack of old-timers... so it was a good blow to the ego.

 
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Well apparently at the very least screamers sense more than 30 blocks. Maybe it was 40 or so. Cause I got dug down to on ma first try. REALLY annoying to have a digger 30 blocks above you, not exactly sure where, and have to dig it out in the morning... >.<

 
Well apparently at the very least screamers sense more than 30 blocks. Maybe it was 40 or so. Cause I got dug down to on ma first try. REALLY annoying to have a digger 30 blocks above you, not exactly sure where, and have to dig it out in the morning... >.<
Click to expand...
Theoretically, From the Shadows could help, but I'm not sure.

 
Some things to note:World Size: 16Kx16K

World Gen: RWG (specifically with A17.1 B9)

I've been on a few threads where more than one person, including myself, felt like underground mining wasn't really what it was in A16 and seemed harder to find certain materials.

I couldn't really take not knowing what has changed or what seems to have changed. So I did what I saw someone else had done and uncommented the visualizations in the blocks.xml config file.

Hopped back into my game, flipped on Debug, flipped on God Mode, and took a spin flying around underground.

Some... Interesting things. And... This is purely desert. So if anyone wants a research project, go for broke on the average behavior of all the biomes.

1st. There's less iron man... Kinda. A16, you'd find iron at bedrock up. Not exactly true in A17. As a matter of fact, I saw no Iron actually in the bottom 10-15 blocks of the map. Other deposits, but not iron.

2nd. Iron is underground, however... It seems that Iron now spawns underground, but on top of other resource veins. You'll see in the screenshots below Oil Shale, and on top of it, are Iron Ore blocks. Basically what this means, is if you are underground mining, and you hit a biome specific vein especially, dig UP. Find the top of it, then dig around the top of the vein. You'll find... some... iron.

3rd. Iron is a near surface ore. It's fairly clear in the screenshots below. Iron is spattered around underground as mentioned in point 2 above. However... Iron has a MUCH greater abundance in the top 30 blocks of terrain in the world.

4th. Nitrate and Coal are almost non-existent in at least the desert. Kinda similar to A16, but IMO it seems much less frequent and much smaller in the amount of these two resources than I'd find in A16.

5th. Lead is just stupid abundant. It's... Everywhere. In the desert area I'm at, at the very least, there is almost as much lead as there is Oil Shale.

My Personal Opinion: I have no idea what TFP was thinking in this type of ore distribution. I don't know why Iron Ore would literally be placed sparingly on top of most biome specific resource veins. But, hey, at least we have a pattern to look for now right? I think TFP kinda moved the slider on Iron and Lead. Increasing the amount of lead you'd find underground, but decreasing the amount of Iron Ore. I also think TFP assumed we'd figure this out. And to couple with the AI changes and digging, the majority of the iron was put within 30 blocks or less of the surface. Which... if I remember the AI discussions correctly, that's the max distance AI will look to find a path to a player. Go fig.

My suggestion to all you underground miners... And what I'll be trying myself. Find a vein of biome specific resource? Dig up. Find the top of it. Then dig around. Seems like the iron is basically set as a flat slab on top of those resource veins. But still... Well below surface.

Best of luck.

NOTE: For some reason the IMG tag doesn't want to work with me. I'll try to get the screen shots up shortly.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/pb42h8n7qtr2um7/oreresearch1.jpg

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6n9udwk6uaen8cz/oreresearch2.jpg?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/opj1tk43x6g4nct/oreresearch3.jpg?dl=0

First Image: Lots of iron within the top 30 blocks of terrain.

oreresearch1.jpg


Second Image: Iron Ore sitting on top of an Oil Shale Vein.

oreresearch2.jpg


Third Image: Lots of resource deposits nearer the surface. Resource deposits underground, but there are bigger gaps between resource veins. I should have taken other screen shots because there are oceans of emptiness underground by bedrock.

oreresearch3.jpg
Click to expand...
Thanks for the info. Can you reupload the images? All 3 images look the same. Can you circle or mark the relevant parts? Eg. in the 2nd image where is the shale deposit?

 
Thanks for the info. Can you reupload the images? All 3 images look the same. Can you circle or mark the relevant parts? Eg. in the 2nd image where is the shale deposit?
Click to expand...
Sorry about that. I guess dropbox doesn't agree with this type of file sharing.

 
In my hundreds of hours in the various builds of A17- and I do a LOT of mining... I always have a super abundance of iron, and it's the other resources I am struggling to find. Iron IS the dominate ore of every biome.

And all that gravel spot digging, almost always just shows iron... my worlds end up with all these nasty holes for vehicles to annoyingly get stuck in. I strongly recommend you folks mod the vehicles xml to give vehicles more hop force (also boost their speeds--including non turbo to match turbo so you don't have to hurt your pinkies anymore- seriously what were you pimps thinking on that? And why no built in auto move forward key? Do you guys even play your own games longer then 50 hour sessions?) =D

HOLY OFF-TOPIC BATMAN!

sorry sorry... okay... so like...

Hordes are GOING to find you eventually... I just make very long tunnels and if 1 area draws attention I run through my tunnels to different spot to lose them all. Later game I just don't even care when I have good armor, I take the sneak attacks and murder death kill them all anyways. It isn't that big a deal, and does not impede my progress that much.

Mining and the underworld needs a complete re-imagining. But I doubt we'll see very much of that because of performance reasons. But thanks for the investigative work. I need lead always, so I guess I should do more desert mining.

 
Also I am offended by your toolbar layout.

Clearly the fireaxe should be slot one, as it gets used the most.

With pickaxe on slot 2, because it gets used 2nd most....

All the safe cracking, door breaking, harvesting... I'm reporting you to the FBI-- Frequently Bound Items department.

 
Also I am offended by your toolbar layout.Clearly the fireaxe should be slot one, as it gets used the most.

With pickaxe on slot 2, because it gets used 2nd most....

All the safe cracking, door breaking, harvesting... I'm reporting you to the FBI-- Frequently Bound Items department.
Click to expand...
Dear lord. Lol

 
Also I am offended by your toolbar layout.Clearly the fireaxe should be slot one, as it gets used the most.

With pickaxe on slot 2, because it gets used 2nd most....

All the safe cracking, door breaking, harvesting... I'm reporting you to the FBI-- Frequently Bound Items department.
Click to expand...
Hahaha welp..... we know what you were doin' right before that post.

ZX79UbX.gif


 
HOW DARE YOU!!!

I AM AN OARFFICER OF THE LAWRE!

WE DON'T DO DON'T DO DO UH DON'T DO, AND DO THINGS LIKE THAT!

As soon as my vision clears I AM GOING TO FIND THINGS WRONG with your motor vehicle, and throw the books at you! And when you and your crooked lawyers try to throw your books at me in retaliation later, I'll cook them books! Now that's going to make the kind of SMOKE this officer likes to huff!

Do you smell what the law is cookin?

This is officer zombo first blood, and you have been BUSTED!

 
In my hundreds of hours in the various builds of A17- and I do a LOT of mining... I always have a super abundance of iron, and it's the other resources I am struggling to find. Iron IS the dominate ore of every biome.And all that gravel spot digging, almost always just shows iron... my worlds end up with all these nasty holes for vehicles to annoyingly get stuck in. I strongly recommend you folks mod the vehicles xml to give vehicles more hop force (also boost their speeds--including non turbo to match turbo so you don't have to hurt your pinkies anymore- seriously what were you pimps thinking on that? And why no built in auto move forward key? Do you guys even play your own games longer then 50 hour sessions?) =D

HOLY OFF-TOPIC BATMAN!

sorry sorry... okay... so like...

Hordes are GOING to find you eventually... I just make very long tunnels and if 1 area draws attention I run through my tunnels to different spot to lose them all. Later game I just don't even care when I have good armor, I take the sneak attacks and murder death kill them all anyways. It isn't that big a deal, and does not impede my progress that much.

Mining and the underworld needs a complete re-imagining. But I doubt we'll see very much of that because of performance reasons. But thanks for the investigative work. I need lead always, so I guess I should do more desert mining.
Click to expand...
Agreed, Im was swimming in iron ore pretty fast, its under every gravel patch I found. Early-mid game I had about 6 mines in different places and biomes and all had iron ore maybe 10-15 blocks form the surface.

For the other ores I just look at the specific biome that has them predominantly and dig to bedrock. I never had to dig far out to find that specific ore (and mostly some other rare ore with them)

At first I hated the ore distribution but its actually a lot less random than the old way once you figure out how to get to it.

It should have a much better explanation in the (early) game though!

 
It's weird that TFP didn't really explain, at least that I can recall, that they were changing underground resource distribution so much. It seems subtle, but if you're a player who is accustomed to digging at bedrock and eventually finding what you need, you'll end up with pretty much no iron. Which... That's kind of major issue for such play styles.

Since I understand much better how resources exist underground, my iron issues vanished. Thankfully. It sucks to go 21 days and barely be able to keep up your iron tool usage.

I used boulders sure. But I really really don't like the whole boulder mining bit. It basically means I constantly have to waste time traveling further and further to find those boulders. And I'm not overly fond of traveling anyway.

I tend to setup base near a large town and that becomes my playground. I usually won't travel much further until day 60 or so when I'm fully geared and able to sit in an over abundance of resource and ammo supply.

 
It's weird that TFP didn't really explain, at least that I can recall, that they were changing underground resource distribution so much. It seems subtle, but if you're a player who is accustomed to digging at bedrock and eventually finding what you need, you'll end up with pretty much no iron. Which... That's kind of major issue for such play styles.
Since I understand much better how resources exist underground, my iron issues vanished. Thankfully. It sucks to go 21 days and barely be able to keep up your iron tool usage.

I used boulders sure. But I really really don't like the whole boulder mining bit. It basically means I constantly have to waste time traveling further and further to find those boulders. And I'm not overly fond of traveling anyway.

I tend to setup base near a large town and that becomes my playground. I usually won't travel much further until day 60 or so when I'm fully geared and able to sit in an over abundance of resource and ammo supply.
Click to expand...
I think the main issue is TFP wanted to prevent players from hiding at bedrock (eg. now zombies can hear/dig to you). I don't think they thought this through and had make all these changes to make that feature work. These are just assumptions so correct me if I'm wrong:

1. Reduced world height. Before bedrock was at -4x (or -5x, can't remember), now it is at +3/+4.

2. There are now much more structural integrity issues while mining. Deserts are a deathtrap for underground mining.

3. Moved iron deposits much closer to the surface.

4. There was a lot more area to work with before but due to #1 they moved predominant ores to bedrock. #3 is also the result of this.

Including the ore in gravel as an indication of what you can find below is a good idea though.

I think that boulders are used for early game when you don't have the perks/tools to mine. I agree that destroying boulders for resources is time consuming when you have to travel further and further out to find more. I'm in SP and it already annoys me. Imagine in a MP server where there are tons of people who just started out. Everyone has the same idea of destroying boulders when they start out so they'll have to travel further away to find some. Imagine a newcomer who joins the server later on - they'll have a tough time. In addition boulders are the first visual to indicate possible ore underground. Destroying them without marking the area makes finding ore deposits harder on the surface. Otherwise you'll have to do a run/drive by and look at the existence of gravel.

A16.4 ore distribution seemed fine to me so I don't understand why they changed the distribution in a17. However I think the main reason is because of the bedrock 'camping' issue. Perhaps another reason is for performance.

 
A16.4 ore distribution seemed fine to me so I don't understand why they changed the distribution in a17. However I think the main reason is because of the bedrock 'camping' issue. Perhaps another reason is for performance.
Click to expand...
Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity." :cocksure:

When they decided to start A17 experimental, RWG was (seemingly) one of the least finished parts and even one with a lower prioirity since the RWG developer was also involved in the big buff redesign AFAIK. Obvioulsy buffs have to work as lots of other systems and the work of other developers depended on it. RWG is a more independent feature and with Navezgane there is always an alternative even if RWG became unplayable (which it wasn't).

Add to that that they pulled the new unfinished RWG code for A17.1 and put some but not all of A16.4's RWG code back in for the moment, until A17s new RWG code is really ready. I say "some" because obviously RWG is not 100% 16.4. And probably it can't be 100% 16.4 anymore because there were irreversible changes, like the feature that the whole map is pregenerated now.

My guess is that either the new system or the mix of old and new system of deposit generation just not had enough bug-fixing and/or balancing time to really be satisfying. And we have to wait for the new RWG code and some balancing work before it goes back to a "fine" distribution

 
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Jackelmyer, glad you got it figured out! I was feeling super bad for you because I have never had any issue finding the ore in any of my saves. I actually hit iron most of the time when I'm digging my initial shaft down to bedrock while looking for other ores lol.

 
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