Legacy:Mining
How to mine
Mining requires building a mine hole or cave. Have a stone axe (slow) or pickaxe (very fast) equipped and use Adventure [A] -> Mine [M] and click on a black tile. Walls within 50 tiles of a cave entrance cannot be mined. Mining drains stamina based on the tool used and the hardness of the tile relative to a character's mining ability. Make sure to bring plenty of drink to restore stamina quickly.
Using a torch or Miner's helmet for light will help drastically when mining, particularly when working older mines whose ore deposits are located far away from the minehole. Note however that using a pickaxe requires both hands, thus making a miner's helm the only portable light source that can be used. (Note: Use of current custom clients with Night vision negates the need for light sources if turned on.)
The world consists of multiple layers--the surface and five underground layers. Caves and mines all are part of the same underworld; a hearthling can tunnel from one mine or cave to another. In the underworld, if a hearthling selects 'mine' and clicks on a wall, he or she will attempt to chip out the wall, either extracting ore from the tile or chipping out stones. Whether the hearthling is able to extract ore (or stones) depends on the soak of the wall. That is to say, some wall tiles will require more strength (and/or better tools) to extract ore or rock from. If the hearthling has enough strength to mine it, the tile will be converted into floor. Ore exists in veins, so you may very well mine nothing but rock. Whether the type of ore has an impact on the soak is unclear.
Note: Because World 4 has brought an entirely new mining system there is confusion. One thing to be said, you need strength in order to mine mining spots. The higher your strength is, the faster the mining spot will be mined. Also, mining spots now contain layers, which means that each tile can be mined multiple times before it converts to floor. Each time you mine there is a chance to get stone or ore. Whether it's ore or stone depends entirely on tile - tile that belongs to vein will not give stones, and tile that does not belong to vein will not give ore. Mined ore is automatically placed in inventory, mined stones are dropped on the ground.
Ores occur in nodes much like everything else on the map. Sometimes the nodes will intersect cave walls, and sometimes you have to dig into the wall for some distance before finding ore. For you to mine a cave wall, you need to click on the wall that is at least 50 tiles from an entrance. Depending on the Q of your tool and your strength, you will start to mine that wall or will receive an error message such as the following.
Messages that occur while mining (each message means 10-15 more Mining ability to mine):
- You dont even manage to scratch that rock.
- That rock is very too much hard for you to mine.
- That rock is too much hard for you to mine.
- That rock is slightly too much hard for you to mine.
- That rock is little too hard for you to mine.
Using a better quality tool and better strength means more tiles to mine available. Strength can be increased by equipment such as a Bear Tooth Talisman or Bear Cape or temporarily with buffs from wine or Boar Tusk Snuff.
Mining Difficulty and Ore Quality
Underground there are 3 types of mining related nodes. Ore veins, Rock quality and Hardness nodes. These nodes are all placed randomly and have no relation to each other except under chance conditions. All rock that is mined will be of the quality equal to the rock quality node (or the base quality if there is no node) of that area. This applies to both stones mined from "empty" rock and ore mined from an ore vein. Finding a soft, high quality ore vein is therefor a very good stroke of luck.
There is only one relation between hardness and quality. As you descend levels of the world, each one gains base quality and base hardness. Quality base goes up by 10 each layer, however it is unknown the exact amount hardness goes up.
Mining Strategy
You can mine zig-zagged lines north south east and west without getting cave-ins and putting mine supports down everywhere. This method is best for mining tunnels to do prospecting. You need to start by putting a mine support down with this you can do a zigzag in any direction listed above. To start you need to mine 3 tiles in the direction you want to zig-zag then turn right or left mine 2 tiles then another 2 tiles in the direction your going then back whichever direction you first chose and repeat. Doing this you will not have any straight line longer than 3 tiles. I have from time to time dug 4 tiles in the direction I was going without getting a cave-in but I would recommend it. DO NOT use this technique for going diagnal it always causes cave-ins when leaving the mine support radius.
You can make the above zig-zag easily walkable by removing the center tile in the zig-zag. Do so is tricky and often ends in a cave-in falling down if your charactor placement isn't spot on. You must stand behind the center tile near the wall E.G.
WWWPW
W P PXW
WPWWW
W P PPW
Stand on the X tile and mine the center wall tile. -Gotrek64
In-Game Text
"Gold gleams in the ground, and iron sleeps in the seam. Mother Nature gives not a sound, but my pick axe will make her scream."
Mining gives you the ability to mine metals in mines, that can be constructed at geology points.