GCountach

True, but then I recall a time I used it to determine the release date for, I believe, Battlefield Bad Company 2. At the top right of the wiki page for it (whatever game it was), the platforms were listed as "Xbox 360, PS3, PC, Your Mom". While I got a good laugh out of it, it still made me cautious to getting my info from there. But here we go! Bituminous Coal: Going by its wiki page, it's main use seems to be to make "coke" which is used to produce cast iron in a blast furnace (bloomery). We already have that with charcoal, so my idea is this: 1.) Bituminous Coal and Charcoal are the same thing, game wise. This is how it is pretty much now, but you can only use it in the forge and not in a bloomery for some reason... 2.) On top of 1.), Bituminous Coal can be cooked in a forge to create "coke". Coke can be used in bloomeries and forges. It would burn hotter and/or longer than coal/charcoal. That's the benefit for making it. I'd prefer longer as, if it were hotter, it may become a requirement for higher tier ores and it would be annoying having to mine for it AND the higher tier ores. Borax: Borax has only two uses worth mentioning here. One is as a flux (which is already in the game) and the other is as a food preservative, which isn't in the game but has been suggested. If that feature makes it in, borax could be one way to preserve food. Cryolite: Read about this one and olivine (see below), I have to wonder if Bioxx planned to add aluminum. Cryolite is apparently kind of rare and is used to separate aluminum out of the ores. I won't pretend I know what I'm talking about here, so I'll just give you the wiki quote "The difficulty of separating aluminum from oxygen in the oxide ores was overcome by the use of cryolite as a flux to dissolve the oxide mineral(s)." Without aluminum, there's only one other use for it and that's as a insecticide and a pesticide. Assuming it ever comes to the point you need that in the game, there are other minerals that will also do the job and they are probably more common.... Cinnabar Currently, cinnabar is how you get redstone. That seems to be a good use for it since it's only other use is to obtain mercury. Mercury could be used to make mirrors, as an antiseptic on cuts, or as a "wobbler lure" in fishing. Since medicine isn't in the game yet, and mirrors seem.... well, pointless, the only other use for cinnabar would be the lure bit. Perhaps somehow adding the lure to your fishing rod will improve your catch rate is the only reason I could see adding mercury and frankly that doesnt' seem worth it. Graphite: Graphite has a lot of uses, almost all of them are quite modern advancements though. That said, it can be used to increased the carbon content in steel. That could perhaps allow you to get higher quality steels in other ways than currently available. Ideally it wouldn't be required to get what steel you can already get. That seems hard enough. An example would be black steel. Currently, you have to make black steel by combining steel, nickel, and black bronze. After you create that, you have to weld it to pig iron and hammer it to produce black steel. In that case, it would be useful to allow you to just use graphite instead of pig iron to get the higher carbon steel, but you could still do it with pig iron if you didn't have graphite. Its other and much more obvious use is as a writing tool. That could help you write books or plans and allow you to not need ink, though it's rarity would be an unncessary barrier to metal working. Having it and ink would mean you'd always use ink too.... so the carbon bit seems to be the most likely use. Gypsum: Amongst other things I learned today, apparently gypsum is used in drywall. That has zero relevance to TFCraft, but I thought it was interesting. Another and more useful purpose is in "Fertilizer and soil conditioner". Given it's apparent commonality in my ore readings, it seems like a reasonable subsitute for vanilla MC's bone meal. It's also used in making mead, but then we need bees and all that jazz, so we'll just stick with bone meal replacement for now. Jet Jet is apparently not so much a mineral as it is a gemstone... so... hmm. That's what I got from the wiki page anyhow. Gemstones are kind of out the scope of this topic. It's really black though. Could be used as a dye, but like graphite, it would be much harder to find than ink sacks so its difficult to determine a purpose for it. Kaolinite <-- No longer spawns Apparently it can be used as an organic insect repleant or to surpress hunger. Surpressing hunger bit is interesting as it could eat it instead of bread or whatever, but it doesn't spawn anymore going by the wiki entry, so it doesn't really matter. Kimberlite Drops diamonds like a boss. That's its only purpose in life so no need to change that. Lapis Lazuli Lapis seems to only have decorative uses in the real world. Keep it as a blue dye. Lignite Lignite is apparently pretty crappy coal. It's only real world purpose is for power generation and they don't even bother to transport it any further than they have to. As it is now, it's a replacement for charcoal which seems fine. Alternatively and/or on top of, it's brown color could possibly be used to obtain brown dye. Olivine Only meaningful thing I found about olivine is "The aluminium foundry industry uses olivine sand to cast objects in aluminum." So perhaps you can use it to make ceramic molds? Petrified Wood Going by the wiki article, it seems to have absolutely no use what so ever. I think it's actually a fossil? Anyway, the article did say that the color of the wood can be changed by what is in it, such as copper or iron oxide. Perhaps there would be some way to obtain one or both of these metals from it. Otherwise I can't see a use for it and it I know it spawns in the game still. Pitchblende It's radioactive, but I'm fairly certain that nuclear reactors are a bit further along in the time scale than Bioxx is shooting for. That said, it apparently decays to lead which is already in the game. Perhaps throwing this stuff into a bloomery would get you lead back, though at lesser amounts than lead rich ores? Saltpeter Saltpeter has two noteworthy uses: Fertilizers and gunpowder. The later seems more useful. Combine it with charcoal and sulfur maybe, you got gunpowder for TNT. This isn't an orignal idea, as it has been mentioned before. Satinspar and Selenite These are apparently just varieties of the mineral gypsum. The wiki article says "Because of the long history of the commercial value and use of both gypsum and alabaster, the four crystalline varieties have been somewhat ignored, except as a curiosity or as rock collectibles." Sounds like a fancy way of saying useless. Don't think they spawn anymore anyway, but if they did, even if it wasn't realistic, they should be comparable to gypsum in use. Serpentine The wiki article states "Soil cover over serpentinite bedrock tends to be thin or absent. Soil with serpentine is poor in calcium and other major plant nutrients, but rich in elements toxic to plants such as chromium and nickel." I'm thinking, similar to pitchblende, throwing this into a bloomery should yield nickel, though in smaller quantities than nickel-rich ores. Sulfur The noteworthy uses of sulfur seem to be fertilizer, fungicide and pesticide, and bacteriocide in winemaking and food preservation. Since none of that stuff is in the game yet, its fallback is an ingredient in making gunpowder. Sylvite "Its principal use is as a potassium fertilizer" says the wiki. Lot of fertilizers on this page for a game without the need of them. Perhaps in a later update. It should be noted that while Kaolinite is the only one I saw in the wiki that was stated as non-existent in new worlds, I'm fairly certain it's not the only one. Ore generation experiments I've done have seem to shown that only bituminous coal, lignite, gypsum, petrified wood, sulfur, jet, and saltpeter currently spawn. Same data also shows that native gold and platinum don't spawn though, which I know is false, so don't take my word for it. The most important take away from this is, with exception of gunpowder creation and wheat fertilizer, most of these minerals are dependent on other aspects of the game being developed before they have a use that's equivalent to their real world use. Most notably agriculture, distilleries, and medicine. That said, if I were to take a shot at finding a purpose for the ores, this is what I'd use them for. Thank you for reading my wall of text and apologies for any grammatical errors or what seems like mindless rambling.

@Brodiggan: If you could try running your seeds in an SMP server and run around to see if you get the same ore distribution, I'd appreciate it. I took World 1's seed from my previous results and did 2 tests. First I did your method of loading it up in SSP and flying around the area to generate the chunks. Then I started a SMP server and did the same (though slower since I didn't have /fly 15 ). Here's the results. MCEdit is the world I generated inside MCEdit with the minecraft_server.jar, SSP is single player with SPC to fly around generating the world, and SMP is starting an SMP server and running around. Seed was -591351512185364480 if you wish to reproduce these results: EDIT: Nvm, thought that was .04 and not .4. My previous conclusion is irrelevant. The ore generation seems to require fly overs. Simplying generating the world in MCEdit won't give you nearly as much ore as you should have. Still, the ore gen algorithim seems very strange. For the same world seed, there is a difference of ~.3% of blocks being ores. Almost 50% more ore in the SSP version than the SMP. With it being just one world, it's hard to draw the conclusion that there's a bug in play here, but it's worth further testing for sure. One other interesting bit of info is that, while there was 46155 claystone generated in MCEdit and 138821 in SSP, SMP said there was *0* claystone in the entire world.

I like anything that improves upon the transporation system in TFCraft. When mines have to be spread so far apart, it only makes sense that something like your suggestion be needed. I especially like the idea of windlass, as it could greatly improve the efficiency of a mine in SMP. I feel like the bucket should have to cost some metal though, like it couldn't be made out of wood to haul a heavy load up afterall, right? Question though: Where is the rope coming from? I'd have to also disagree with using wood for the roadways. Wood would rot and give with a load on it and would be easier to use (afterall, you don't have to build a bridge if the blocks just hover in the air, unlike cobble). I think it'd have to be stone/cobblestone/equivelants only. Last questions: how would you know if a wooden rail is in need of "maintence" (and in that regard, what would you do to maintain it?)? Would there be a visual sign it's falling apart, or would you just roll around on them until they start breaking out from under you? Would maintain them by repairing or just flat out replacing?

Bioxx's sticky thread in this very subforum seems relevant here: It seems when there is minerals like saltpeter around, other ores seem to alway be near/connected to it. Clicking with the pick in other places should make them show up, but it's of course not certain. If nothing else, you should try to find the edges of the saltpeter (or any other mineral, that is just the one given in the OP) to see if any other ore is visible. Trying to get the pick changed to be easier though isn't going to happen. Related to the actual thread though, I agree that minerals need to be more fleshed out, but I have no idea what any of the minerals are for IRL so I can't provide any worthwhile suggestions. I've gone through so many threads thus far that my head is spinning with facts, speculations, and conflicting reports. I thought I read though that saltpeter can be used to create gunpowder though? Wikipedia says it's real world use is in fertlizers and gunpowder, so it seems likely it will be if it isn't already.

I was assuming that's how you were generating a 45x45 chunk world. What is your method for pre-generating a world? Merely running around didn't seem reliable. I will try using the world seeds in SSP, but MCedit seems to put the spawn area in a weird location relative to the actual word (IE it puts me nearly in one corner of the world instead of dead center). EDIT: It's hard to say for sure, but it appears SSP generates the same seed slightly different. It looks very similar, but there is slight differences (where sand is instead of dirt, where there's exposed stone instead of dirt, etc.). When I made the world with the same seed on a SMP server, the world seemed identical. On the one large hillside I was looking at, SSP had some dirt where stone was, but in SMP, the stone, dirt, and sand were in the exact same spots as in MCEdit. I double checked and the SMP and SSP seeds are the same. Not sure what amount of variation is expected. That said, I narrowed down a spot in the world where some ore was using MCedit. Both SSP and SMP had ore there, though I didn't dig it all out to make sure it was the same amounts. At a loss here.

I've been trying to create a few worlds and generate data for this thread. I've managed to bypass my memory error by using an unoffical 64-bit build (using the offical 32-bit always would cause it to run out of memory before completing a 45x45 chunk anaylsis). My results though are troubling. I actually logged into the minecraft_server.jar I created to make sure I was using 46e. Sadly, I was. My process is this: 1.) Create a 45x45 chunk world in MCEdit using the 46e minecraft_server.jar as the world gen. Check the simulate world box. 2.) Hit CTRL+A once it's created to select the entire world and then hit the anaylze button 3.) Hit save file... when anaylizing is complete. 4.) Load comma seperate results into Open Office. Trim off anything above Granite as well as anything in the entities and below. 5.) For each ore, add up the entire column of stone and ores and divide the ore for a given row by that amount to get the percentage of ore per any given block 6.) For each ore, add up the entire cloumn of just ores and divide the ore for a given row by that amount to get the percentage of that ore in relation to all ores generated I generated 6 worlds before I decided to stop, thinking something was wrong. Here is my results: EDIT: Apparently html isn't allowed. Shame, simple <.table><./table> could of made this all much easier. BTW, in regards to your lack of sulfur, sulfur seems to have its own block going by the config file and MCEdit when you look around lava. It's 208:0-208:3. 3 is the highest I found anyway. EDIT2: BTW, I noticed in some of the worlds I was generating that certain rock formations didn't appear AT ALL. World 5 for instance had 0 blocks of Phyllite and a few other worlds were like that too. Anyone else having worlds generated that do that?

If you get it in the next 19 hours on steam, it's 40% off. thats $18 for combined operations. Don't know what that is in any other currency.

Loving the work you're doing. Your data has caused me any my friend to decide to take the plung and regenerate our world. One question though: how are you determining "near surface"? Is it anything above y=90, anything <12 from grass or what? It does seem concerning given the data present, but as more worlds are generated and their results posted, the data will hopefully show more gold on the average world.

Very impressive work. I'm currently attempting to try and provide my own data for this thread. I even figured out how to generate a TFCraft world in MCEdit so that I could predefine the chunk size. I started at 100x100 chunks which gives me a world that's ~1800x1800x256, but I keep getting a memory error when I try it. Tired now, will try more tomorrow. On topic with this post, I noticed the change log for 46d says they'll be a ~10% increase in ore generation rates. New data awaits!

Not sure about your bat file problem, but someone has reported this bug already. That said, if you wish to fix it, download INVedit and open up the level.dat in your world's save folder (backup the orignal of course, just in case). Find the rock in question and drag it to the trash can. save and close. If you're not sure which one it is, it'll be the rock with a damage value of 30. EDIT: Btw, The Bug Report Is Here. If you have any idea how to reproduce it, I imagine it would be of great help to add that to it.

I would certainly enjoy a quicker year. I've been playing non-stop it feels like for a week and I think I'm still in spring. Heard that fruit is delicious though.. If possible, I believe a multiplier in the config would be ideal, instead of changing it to 200 days for SSP and SMP. In a 24/7 SMP server, 30 hours a season seems short, but in SSP you could play for over a month before you see a full year... probably more. The only issue I could see coming from this is that it would mess up the calender. One possible solution I can think of is to remove the exact date from the calender menu and just leave the "early/mid/late <season>" there. Once it gets into late fall, you know you best get everything you need done before winter. The exact date seems like unnecessary information at that point, and will not tie you to the 365 day calender.

I believe they are referring to this: http://www.terrafirmacraft.com/quick-update/ Posted on the homepage.

I don't know about the shelves, for the reasons you stated, but I absolutely love the bin idea. A quick and dirty way to empty all the stone and dirt I have in my inventory would be great.

While a config option would be cool, I rather like the standardization of the smaller sizes. It removes possible conflicts between client and server (what is one client allows big chests and one doesn't?). The bigger problem with chests size nerf is that, as of right now, it's the only way to store anything. I rather development time be spent implementing new storage options then a config switch. In the end, better storage options would be more beneifcial to the mod.

I'm using my old Build 45 jar that I just copied 46b into, but when I started a new world I was able to find surface rocks. Can you provide more information? 1.) What mods did you install? 2.) What version were those mods? 3.) What order did you install them? 4.) What seed are you using in your world? 5.) Have you tried making another world to see if that one seed was messed up? 6.) What OS are you using? Any other information you can think of to provide wouldn't hurt.

I'm not sure about the neutral mobs, but I've noticed I haven't been getting any drops from the hostile mobs either since I've updated from 45 to 46b. Wondering if the rate is just really low or what.