Introduction to -tg- Mining

[DZD]

 

To preface this, I'm just going to say that mining became a good bit more difficult. You can still stay on the safe side of the asteroid, although you won't find anywhere near as many minerals as you would previously. If you head out to the western portion of the asteroid alone and ill-prepared, don't be surprised if you die, and don't be surprised if nobody ever finds your body.

 

Ores & Metal Sheets

To start it off, platinum, hydrogen, and coal are no longer ores. Metal sheets are made from smelting iron, plasteel is made from smelting plasma and iron. Refined uranium, silver, gold, and diamond sheets are still made from their respective ores. Furthermore, you no longer need to use the manual smelter to smelt sheets (and make boatloads of slag because you messed up the settings). The reason for this is that the ore redemption machine now exists. It is located in cargo, and you simply dump all of your ores in the tile to the north of it (the input and output floor tiles have convenient indicator arrows painted onto them) and it will store said ores.

 

There is also a new ore type, Gibtonite. Gibtonite is highly volatile, and when mined it will start a chain reaction which will lead to an explosion. Said chain reaction can be disabled by clicking the gibtonite ore wall with a mining scanner, after which you can safely mine out the gibtonite ore. The gibtonite ore cannot be processed, and if activated again by hitting it with a pickaxe, will start a chain reaction once more. The closer it was to exploding when it was first deactivated, the higher the explosive yield of the newly reactivated ore. Gibtonite can be used for high-speed explosive mining, or for more nefarious purposes.

 

Anyone with chemistry, bar, research, or Chief Engineer access can come over to the redemption machine and request processed sheets from it, at which point it will smelt any stored ores and plop the processed sheets onto its output tile. Now, you might ask exactly *why* you would want to turn ores into the ore redemption machine for the rest of the station to use instead of hoarding them for yourself and building your own little fort on the asteroid. Well, as the ore redemption machine eats up ores, it builds up points. You can place your ID into the ore redemption machine and claim said points, which leads to the next section...

 

The Mining Equipment Vendor

The mining equipment vendor is just that, it holds a large stock of equipment that might be useful while mining, ranging from a diamond pickaxe, to a mining jetpack, to fake facehugger toys (well, not all of them can be useful I suppose). These items cost points, ranging from 2000 points for a 1000 space credit bill, to 50 points for a teporone or stimulant autoinjector. The point values for different ores are listed below with the ore type first followed by the point value.

 

Sand - 1

Iron - 1

Gold - 20

Silver 20

Uranium - 20

Bananium - 30

Diamond - 40

Plasma - 40

 

Bluespace crystals can now also be found while mining, and although they can't be redeemed for points or stored in an ore bag, they are still useful for a quick getaways, as crushing one in your hand will teleport you to a random tile that is within a 10 tile radius of you. You can also throw bluespace crystals at somebody to subject them to said teleportation instead.

 

The catch now however is that you can't just see all of the ores with only your mesons, you have to carry around an ore scanner to scan for ores. When you use an ore scanner, it will reveal any and all ores on screen except iron, which is revealed by default.

 

The Asteroid

The entire eastern section of the asteroid is now less mineral-rich, and you'll have trouble finding many of the rarer ore types there. On the other hand, the entire western portion of the asteroid is now more mineral rich, however there are now monsters that spawn in caves on that section of the asteroid. You *can* avoid the monsters by avoiding caves, although doing so will limit your movement through that section of the asteroid, as going through caves scanning for ores is much faster than manually mining through solid stone.

 

Secret rooms found on the asteroid are now different than they were previously. They are no longer surrounded by reinforced walls, and the variety of loot that you can find inside of them has changed. There are also different room types, which each have their own drop tables for what you may find inside.

 

One last thing, that area to the far west of the asteroid with a lot of floating asteroid bits is no longer filled with ridiculous amounts of ores.

 

Meet the Monsters

Starting from the smallest threats to the largest, you will find goldgrubs, hivelords, basilisks, and goliaths on the asteroid now.

 

Goldgrubs - These annoying little creatures will eat up any loose ores they find on the ground, and will try to run away if you get near them. It is advisable to quickly kill them, as they can eat large amounts of ores, and will burrow away given enough time. Goldgrubs will drop whatever ores they may have eaten upon death.

 

Hivelords - You may already be acquainted with these pests. While not extremely dangerous, hivelords will unleash hivelord broods to try to overwhelm you. Fortunately, the broods die in a single hit, and the hivelords by themselves don't pose much of a threat. If you manage to kill a hivelord, it will drop its core, which can then be eaten to fully restore you back to health. Be quick about it though, hivelord cores quickly spoil if not eaten.

 

Basilisks - These are likely the first real threat you will face on the asteroid. They will not attack you unless you approach them, and they prefer to blast you with freezing beams from a distance, which will significantly slow down your movement, and may cause damage if they drop your body temperature significantly. If you get within melee range of a basilisk, it will fight back, although they are not particularly threatening, dealing less direct damage than a normal space carp. If you manage to kill one, it will drop two pieces of diamond ore. One thing to note is that basilisks are vulnerable to explosions, so if you manage to get your hands on some gibtonite, don't hesitate to use it on one, otherwise, you would be best off smashing the basilisk with a pickaxe in melee range.

 

Goliaths - The biggest reason the life expectancy of miners is fairly short. Goliaths are not to be underestimated, they pack a serious punch, don't go down easily, and are capable of using a ranged tentacle attack. Their tentacle attack will trap any miner foolish enough to stand on top of the tentacles for too long, however it can be easily moved out of. It is recommended to use a ranged weapon to fight a Goliath, as kiting is a very effective way to kill one without being horribly mauled.

If you manage to kill a Goliath, it will drop goliath hide plates, which can be used to reinforce a mining hardsuit, mining hardsuit helmet, or Ripley's armor, when fully upgraded, a mining hardsuit (or helmet) is as resistant to melee damage as a riot suit. Those who have a death wish may want to try punching a Goliath to death.

 

New Combat Tools

 

To make up for the fact that the western portion of the asteroid is now infested by deadly monsters, miners now start off with an equipment voucher (as well as a pickaxe instead of a drill) which can be turned into the mining equipment vendor for a choice of one out of four items. These items are the Kinetic Accelerator, Resonator, Mining Drone, and Advanced Mining Scanner. The uses for these items are all broken down below. They are also available for purchase with mining points at the equipment vendor.

 

Kinetic Accelerator - A single-shot projectile weapon specialized for use in a hard vacuum. Projectiles fired from this weapon detonate on impact (not an explosion, just a visual effect) and deal damage to the target. In a pressurized environment, it only deals a paltry 10 brute damage to the target, while in a vacuum it is capable of dealing 40. The downside is that it has a 1.6 second cooldown between each shot, after which it must be reloaded by clicking the weapon in hand (or using Y in hotkey mode). Kinetic Accelerator projectiles will also mine through rock.

 

Resonator - Another weapon specialized for use in a hard vacuum. The Resonator is capable of placing down resonance fields on tiles where clicked, where after 3 or 5 (configurable by activating the resonator) seconds, it will detonate, damaging any mob inside of it. In a pressurized environment, it will deal 20 damage, while in a vacuum it will deal 50. Resonance blasts will also mine through rock.

 

Mining Drones - Cute little drones that can either be extremely helpful, or extremely annoying. They have two modes, combat and collection mode. While in combat mode, it will fight any hostile creatures it finds within its view range, it will do so by firing kinetic accelerator blasts from a distance, or hitting said creature with a mining drill from up close. The danger is that, if you're standing in the way, they are also likely to hit you while trying to shoot at their target. In collection mode, they are much less dangerous, and will simply pick up any loose ores on the ground, you can tap a drone with a mining scanner to make it drop its loose ores. Drones also come with a welder should the drone require repairs.

 

Advanced Mining Scanner - This tool basically combines the mining scanner with a t-ray scanner, when activated, it will continuously scan for ores on screen in short intervals. Not really much to say about this, anything you could use a mining scanner for you could also use one of these for. A mech-mounted mining scanner also exists, and functions similarly to the advanced scanner.

 

Plasma Cutters - Unlike the other tools listed above, plasma cutters are not available at the mining equipment vendor, but they have been changed fairly significantly. They are now actual guns, but as with the other mining weapons, are specialized for use in a vacuum. They fire plasma projectiles that only do 5 damage and travel 1 tile in a pressurized environment, these numbers are tripled in a vacuum. The projectiles are low-cost, and plasma cutters can be refueled with plasma bars or plasma ore, but cannot be recharged like conventional energy guns.

An advanced version of the plasma cutter exists, which has double the range and fires bolts for 20% of the energy cost of a regular plasma cutter. There is also a mech-mounted version that drains even less power, does twice as much damage, and has an additional 50% range over the regular advanced plasma cutter (for lazy, 15 tile range and 30 damage in a vacuum).

 

Misc. Information

 

 

• Mining cyborgs have been re-equipped to handle the new mining environment, they now have access to an advanced mining scanner and a kinetic accelerator.

• Plasmaman miner spacesuits now have the same slowdown as a regular miner's spacesuit, and can now be upgraded with goliath hide plates.

The diamond drill no longer reigns supreme as the fastest item for mining, the sonic jackhammer has stolen the throne for itself, but has also had its resource costs and research requirements upped to match.

 

 

I would still recommend taking a gander at the mining page on -tg-'s wiki.

 

[improvedname]

Don't forget you can weld the ores now to smelt it

[davidchan]

 

Is there anyway to make a mining drone follow you? The little guys are cute but that wander is annoying. I don't really know how much they can hold either, since I typically do an orebox it gets frustrating when I try to bring a drone and it wanders off.

 

Also, are Plasma Cutters and Sonic Jackhammers moved to Weapons tab in the protolathe? I was trying to print one out for a miner after I maxed 'legal research' but I couldn't find it.

 

[Spacemanspark]

I was actually going to suggest we make mining drones follow their owners.