VDZ wrote:You mean 'tedious'. It is never an actual question whether you can afford the resources to maintain your Mine Supports - they're cheap enough that the answer is always to just repair the things. The problem is that wooden supports require wood, which contrary to what an earlier post implied do not in fact grow commonly enough or in great enough numbers underground to maintain them, and stone columns require nuggets, which likewise require materials to be carried into the mine from outside (either bricks for the crucible and coal to fuel it, or the nuggets themselves). It's never a challenge in that in certain circumstances it's infeasible or undesirable - it's always feasible and desireable. It's just a hassle.
I always found tediousness to be an important limiting factor in this game. It what makes people do stuff in reasonable ammount. One farmer can make 500x500 plot, but it's tedious. Hunter can kill wagons of stuff reasonably fast, but the butchering / drying / sorting is what makes it a chore. My opinion is, that's what supports are for mining. Without them, mining turns into pure afk task, limited by pretty much energy only. With them in game you have to ask yourself "do i rly want to bother?".