Mining Observations and Suggestions

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Edoras
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Joined: Mon Sep 11, 2017 9:45 am

Mining Observations and Suggestions

Post by Edoras »

Hello! After putting some time into mining and a bit of exploration/character building, I have a few things to say.

First of all, I love mining! No matter how simple or complex it is I just enjoy player gathering/crafting. That said, mining is very simple at the moment, which is fine: I also recognize that the game is still actively being developed, so I realize it's not going to be super complex. I do have a few thoughts that might make it a little more engaging or interesting without making it much more complex and/or too powerful. I know we're all just waiting with bated breath on that coal mine that's JUST around the corner!

First my current understanding: If these presumptions are wrong then my suggestions may be off.
1) Selling raw materials from mining to market is not at -all- currently rewarding in raw riln. This isn't a bad thing necessarily; I just find it worth pointing out.
2) Mining seems to operate on the current following principle: it seems that mining in a room is guaranteed to produce multiple ore chunks in a row, then multiple barren stone in a row, and this seems to cycle back and forth as the room is mined: You're guaranteed to get 2-6 ore, then 2-6 barren, then 2-6 ore, etc. (The exact numbers are not set in stone but are also not known to me). Rias has said, and this seems to be true, that the specific room you choose in a mine along with chance affects how often a room swaps from barren to ore stone. I'm not sure if mining skill has any effect on the chance of a room going from barren->ore-containing or vice versa.
3) Surveying seems to only display the current state of a room, as in whether its next mining attempt will retrieve ore-containing stone or barren stone. Surveying doesn't provide any additional information beyond that, not even the types of ore one -might- encounter if they kept mining in the room.
4) Resultingly, mining generates a lot of barren stone alongside ore-containing stone, and the barren stone is worth very little on the market. This tends to cause me, as a miner, to be tempted to just toss the barren stone randomly somewhere and hope some janitor code cleans it up, since it takes a decent amount of time/effort to get it back to town only to sell it for 10% of what people will usually pay for the ore-containing stone. Practically, I end up eventually taking the time to cart it all back to town and sell it for peanuts, thus overstocking barren stone.

To sum up my current understanding: the most efficient tactic available for mining seems to be to sit in one room mining until prompted to move, and to either dump your barren stone or soak the extra travel time just to sell it for very little on the market.

Here's my ideals:
A) It would be nice if there was more incentive to make decisions while mining.
B) It would be nice if skill progression in mining felt more impactful.
C) It would be nice if barren stone, at least from distant locations, was more rewarding to sell to market and/or if there were mechanics to bypass it.

Here's my suggestions!
A1) What if the 'survey' command, as you gained mining skill, also displayed the relative likelihood of a new vein appearing?
You make a thorough survey of the area ...
You might be able to mine the deepslate here.
You notice traces of gold in the deepslate, indicating the possible presence of a vein.
To your trained eye, the immediate area seems abundant in mineral deposits.
-OR-
To your trained eye, the immediate area seems largely barren.
-OR-
To your trained eye, the immediate area seems to have a reasonable yield.
A2) What if the 'survey' command included the relative attractiveness of the current area compared to its neighbors?
You make a thorough survey of the area ...
You might be able to mine the deepslate here.
You notice traces of gold in the deepslate, indicating the possible presence of a vein.
The southeastern passage suggests signs of a higher yield.
Your immediate surroundings seem more mineral rich than the western passageway.
I realize the above changes only add to the game if different rooms became more/less mineral-rich over time and/or as rooms are mined out, which may not be a mechanic that exists or will be implemented.

B1) What if, whenever your mining skill caused you to keep on a vein instead of going back to barren stone, you received a notification as such? This may be already how it works, it would just be fun to see it happening, especially if it happened more often as you improved in mining skill.
You dislodge a large chunk of cobblestone (traces of coal) with your fir-hafted iron pickaxe.
You put a large chunk of cobblestone (traces of coal) into your weathered pine minecart.
Your eye catches a continuation of the coal vein you've been mining!
C1) What if there was a 'prospect' command that you could use to 'mine past' barren stone at double speed, so that instead of dropping the barren stone or ore in the room, you skipped over it with the goal of trying to find ore instead? This would bring more incentive to using the 'survey' command while mining, plus it may also add more value/rarity to the barren stone since less miners would end up carting and selling their stone at market price just to get rid of it.

I mostly am trying to focus on reasonable improvements: I assume mining will by default become more interesting as the game is more fleshed out: adding in new kinds of mines, gems, etc. Of course I would love a lot of more complicated things as well, like player-owned mines, the ability to lay down my own minecart tracks, the ability to make minecarts, etc. etc, but all of those are long in the future I imagine.
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