I recently joined your ranks and up to now I really like this wonderful game.
I’m fairly new but I watched many let’s plays and did some research before posting here.
Questions:
Do the ores appear with certain conditions in SH, let’s say like in Minecraft where if I want diamonds, I need to go to level X, etc etc.
1b) I’m asking this because I’m wondering if in a mountain, digging down yields more ores than digging straight into the mountains.
So are ores locked to specific conditions (except being in rock) like biome, height, proximity to other nodes etc. or is the distribution quite random?
Thanks for your help, and thanks to the devs for this original game!
I can only speak of experience and don’t know how the developers progarmmed it, but it seems the distribution of ore isn’t depending on the height (or depth). The only thing that’s depending on height are veins of ore which aren’t found undergrund (under the minimal level of the surface) but in mountains and hills.
So if I understand what you are saying: according to your experience, if I dig in a mountain at 64, 48 or 12 height, it should be the same thing as far as quantity go?
Yes, the quantity of ores should be nearly the same disregarding the height. But the quantyity is different between the types of ores. If you need big quantities of a specific ore in short time you should search for a vein in the mountains. The biggest one yield up to 200-250 blocks of ore.
Just a small correction, vein ores can spawn underground, even in a plain field, not only in or below a mountain. I’m digging a huge hole in a plain and there was a silver vein there.
Also, to add to the topic, ores veins are only visible when near your hearthlings visible map area. Those too far into the fog are not visible until someone go near it. That’s why on embark you can’t see any ores, but after it, the closest mountain will probably have some showing at the sides.
Okay, until now I found oreveins only above the minimal surface height. But you’ll have to agree that they are more easy to find in mountains or hills, especially because they are partly visible.
Yes, if one is searching for ores, just move your hearthlings around mountain to reveal the ores, digging down would be a waste of time as it is much harder to get something.
So I didn’t know that veins didn’t spawn / were rarer under ‘‘ground’’ level. I dug down in the mountains at 2 different height and after extensive digging, didn’t spot any veins. Is the limit for vein-spawning the lowest point ‘‘outside’’ without digging?
I can’t give an exact value but at least I haven’t faund any below yet. But I agree with BrunoSupremo. Move your hearthlings around a mountain to let the veins render and look in the mountainsides for the veins of the required ore. They’re relatively easy to spot (maybe with exception from tin, that is only slightly lighter than the surrounding stone)
