"No minerals found" A rant about prospection.

[KiT]

Disclaimer: this post is fileld with excessive amounts of swearing and RAEG. Read at your own risk. Do not give to kids of age 3 and less.

So after i finally grinded enough LP to get my exploration to high enough level to find rustrots, i decided to prepare for an expedition to the furthest possible place, hoping to find an unoccupied mine there and live a calm hermit life there.
And so i left my place, with just some ink, parchments, rustroot extract, some basic tools, food, and a litte con and combat skill, which meant i couldnt just swim over rivers and had to run away from everything level over 5. But i knew, the lter i go, the less chance will be that i will find an unoccupied mine.
I travelled across the whole main supergrid, from the north-east to south-est and then to south-west, and entered the south-western grid. Since most population lives in north-east, i hoped that it would still be in pristine state. And it truly was like that. Not a single sign of any human presence, all animals at lvlX, forcing me to travel close to the rivers. Overally, i think i've spent about 4-5 hours to get there. On my way across the grid, i prospected a few times, "No minerals found". Oh well, all the mines are probably deeper into the continent, i thought. I set up a camp in the middle of the supergrid and decided to finally do some more prospecting. "No minerals found"..."No minerals found"..."No minerals found"..."No minerals found"..."No minerals found"..."No minerals found"...
I think i have explored about 1/3rd of the supergrid and 3 caves. The only result i could find was "No minerals found".
Now thats awesome. What kind of bullshit is this?

I got 2 versions about why this is happening.
1: Some hugely overpowered jerk who can kill bears in 1 hit and swim across oceans has simply walked around with a few barrels of rustroot extract, found all mines and put 1 block in their construction sites. Game over. Now nobody can find mines any way other than seeing them directly. What an awesome feature. How many people have succesfully prospected for mines, i wonder? I think not more than 20-30, probably around 10. Awesome, isnt it? A whole feature, some items and recipes, made purely so that 10 people could have some fun. Couldnt you just pick the server's top 10 players, give them the location of all mines and a few hundred thousand LP, and not waste your time coding that "prospection".
What the fuck. Seriously, what the fuck? Why the fuck isnt it possible to find the location of already built mines. Just give me a fucking reason. Even when mines are built, prospection would work as a way to find the nearest settlement. But no, instead you let a bunch of people just find all the mines, block any chance to easily find them for anyone else, and thats it. Fucking thank you.
2: "YOU REQUIRE MORE VESPENE GAS".
"Yeah, we give you ability to see rustroots, but you still need 100 more exploration to actually be able to find mines". Then why the fuck do you give it to me!? Are you fucking trolling me? What am i suposed to do with that ability if i completely cant use it anyway, and its not written absolutely ANYWHERE? Am i supposed to be a psychic and KNOW that i actually need 3 times more exploration to actually find mines, and the rustroots are here just to taunt me? Well, then they have done good job as i am fucking mad now.

[ATR]

Or, they might just be rare.

[KiT]

Or, they might just be rare.

There are at least 3 overland mines on the main supergrid i know of. The real number is probably no less than 4-5.

It's stated in the prospecting description that u can detect mine when in radious of 1000 form it. Now try to put multiple radius 1000 cicles (so diameter is 2000) in a 5000 sized square without making them overlap too much. You will see that most of the square area will be covered by these circles. And i have prospected multiple times, in different distant parts of the supergrid. If there were unoccupied mines, i would see them.

Now, while we're at it, can we get some deeper explanation on mine positioning? Can they be less than 2000 tiles away from each others so that their territories overlap? What happens then, does prospecting detect the nearest mine?

[Blaze]

Prospecting when near several mines will show percentages for each one.

[PhaedrothSP]

Prospecting when near several mines will show percentages for each one.

I'm not sure what upsets me more, the three mine's located, or the boar helmet layering over the cloak.

[XkrikX]

Prospecting when near several mines will show percentages for each one.

I'm not sure what upsets me more, the three mine's located, or the boar helmet layering over the cloak.

was just thninking that

[theTrav]

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GASP! so there's tin near the swamp! TO THE SWAMP!!!