Mining in A17 240

[Sisyphus]

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.

[OzHawkeye]

Well, I rarely, and in A17, never bother to mine underground any more.

 

Iron - there's so much of this in POI's that within a few weeks of Day 1 I've got many multiple stacks of 6,000 scrap iron.

 

Lead & Nitrate and Coal - I have little use for these, and what uses I do have for them, I get from the small boulders as I never use explosives, rarely fire my gun (mainly melee Zeek) and don't often have need of their other niche recipes.

 

Shale - there's so many gas cans in cars, I could fuel my vehicle into A19 already I reckon.

[SenpaiThatIngnoresYou]

I get mine collapse all the time, and die from them. Granted, i tunnel more than mine.

[Kam R.]

Good info. Reading this and based on my own (little) a17 mining experience so far, I suspect the old biome rules more or less still apply, where a specific ore is most prevalent in a certain biome, but you can find everything anywhere, with oil being the exception.

[TopAce6]

Well, I rarely, and in A17, never bother to mine underground any more.

 

Iron - there's so much of this in POI's that within a few weeks of Day 1 I've got many multiple stacks of 6,000 scrap iron.

 

Lead & Nitrate and Coal - I have little use for these, and what uses I do have for them, I get from the small boulders as I never use explosives, rarely fire my gun (mainly melee Zeek) and don't often have need of their other niche recipes.

 

Shale - there's so many gas cans in cars, I could fuel my vehicle into A19 already I reckon.

 

 

 

This is a few in game hours, now with my moded (ingame item mods, not .xml mods) auger.... it goes much faster.

 

[LuckyStar]

Definitely have to change tactics for A17.

 

The same old routine's we had in A16 don't work anymore.

 

That's a good thing I think.

 

We'll adapt and make our way eventually.

[sadpickle]

I found an oil shale deposit by accident (tunneling into desert on the second night) and within two weeks of on-and-off mining I had thousands of shale.

[Sisyphus]

Well, I rarely, and in A17, never bother to mine underground any more.

 

Iron - there's so much of this in POI's that within a few weeks of Day 1 I've got many multiple stacks of 6,000 scrap iron.

 

Lead & Nitrate and Coal - I have little use for these, and what uses I do have for them, I get from the small boulders as I never use explosives, rarely fire my gun (mainly melee Zeek) and don't often have need of their other niche recipes.

 

Shale - there's so many gas cans in cars, I could fuel my vehicle into A19 already I reckon.

 

Definitely agree on the iron

 

I've been using the gun a lot when surprised by ferals in POI's and on horde nights, hence my interest in Lead & Nitrate and Coal

 

As far as the shale goes, most of my fuel consumption has been for the auger, which really runs through it fast. There are certainly enough cars to keep that going for the foreseeable future, but I'd also like to packrat a few thousand shale away just to know it's there.