Mining 101

Based on an artical by Azaghal, created on 10/06/2003
Updates by "The PogoWolf" on 1/10/05
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Q: So what does it take to be a miner?
Well, it's not as easy as being, say, an Armorer. It takes hard work, commitment, and a big chunk of your life to get very far. Being a bit crazy helps too. A miner takes no prerequisites and you can be one just as soon as you can find a trainer.

So far there are two trainers in game.

Dalimond: Jasmie is right across the road from the Outfitter trainer in a building that also containes the Blacksmith trainer.
Augendale: Down in the tunnls is where this trainer in located.
??? other places?

Now you're a miner. So what now?


Q: What does a Miner do?
Being a Miner means the only things you can make are bricks, bars, Gems, and perhaps Parcels. I say 'perhaps Parcels' because they
are OLD forms that are no longer in game. You'll be lucky to find them, and there are beginner and jourymen versions floating around
(NOTE: and I'm looking for the Jourymen versions.. let me know if you see them..hehehe)


What's a parcel you ask? Well, a parcel is a little?um. Well, it's kinda like a?er. Actually I'm not really sure what the hell it is, but as long as the Empire is willing to give us experience for making them, it don't matter What they are. This is about the only way we can advance in any reasonable amount of time. It's a snails' pace, but better than just making bars till you go blind.

Leveling to 10th will be about the longest gaming experience of your life. I suggest making bronze widgets for this since the mine is closer to town than the quarry. Go to the Shrine and bind yourself to it. Then, talk to the Questmaster next to it and ask for a crafting quest. Widgets are made directly at the smelter from ore. Until 3rd level, it's a toss-up as to whether making bars or widgets is the quickest way to go, so I'd suggest skipping the quest until 3rd and sell the bars you make to get better equipment. Up to level 10, you'll only be able to make enough widgets to make you wonder why you became a miner in the first place. However, sometime around 8th you'll find you're able to get 2 ore/stone per swing. This will make the going a bit easier, especially after 10th when you can take the 60 widget quest.

By itself, the widget quest doesn't help you much after a certain level. However, you can take all 3 of the widget quests at the same time. This really helps to get you up there since after 10th you can get 1200 xp per trip. At around 15th level, the turn around time is about 15 minutes depending on your commitment and equipment.

Equipment:

A miner gains 12 points per level in quarrying and mining. This means that by level 20, you'll have a base skill of 250. With the right tools and equipment, you can get that to around 300 easily. A miner is only as good as his equipment. Upgrade as soon and as often as you can.

What equipment you say? Well, the main thing you want right away is to upgrade your training equipment since they limit your skills to 40. With enough coin in your purse, you'll also want to get some teched items, like a couple pickaxes with mining and quarrying 3. Another couple of useful items are the fabric backpack and the rough hide satchel. The backpack increases your carrying capacity to 1200, while the satchel increases it by 150 and is available for use at level 10. At later levels, you're also going to want cargo clothes and either a standard or deluxe cargo disk. Cargo equipment can only be made by tinkers, so get to be friends with one and maybe work out a deal to exchange bars for goods, with maybe some coin to sweeten the deal. Cargo clothing can also be teched, so get with your tinker to see which items can have what. On a side note, you'd be wise to invest in some quickstep cargo boots when you can use em (depending on availability of course). You'll thank me later when you're hauling a deluxe cargo disk around.

The Cargo Disk: A Miners' friend

At around 12th level, you'll be haulin in enough ore to make having a disk worthwhile. I'd suggest starting out with a standard, which holds 250 ore, and upgrading to a deluxe, which holds 500, at 15th. At that time, it takes about 480 ore to finish the widgets for the quest and in the meantime you'll only get the -25 to your run. A deluxe takes a whopping 40 off, which means when you're hauling your ore around, you're going to be walking.

When out in the field, it's best to park your disk and run to all the nodes rather than pulling it around behind you. This will speed up the gathering process a bit and allow you to go free ranging for ore that hasn't been picked over by others. Remember, you're going to be competing for resources out there at first, so you're going to need every advantage to get what you need to level.

To park the disk, just move it to the cargo disk placement icon on the bottom right of your equipment window. The left icon puts it in tow mode. The tow mode is when you get the run penalty, so when you get ready to go make your goods, just run by the disk and move the disk icon from the right to the left. I'd suggest hotkeying your sprint skill so that you can get there at a reasonable pace. You'll probably be walking the last few feet, but it's better than walking all the way. While you're at it, hotkey your pickaxe so you don't have to keep digging through your pack.

It's usually best to park the disk reasonably close to the smelter. Not too close since you are probably going to be ranging a good ways to get the ore you need, but not so far that you're going to be walking halfway back. It's also a good idea to switch off where you park it so you don't over mine a particular area.

Keep your primary inventory open and your cargo disk inventory minimized at the top of your screen so that you can make a quick switch from your inventory to your disk. You'll have to move to within a reasonable distance to switch off, but with practice, you'll be able to do this without breaking your pace.

The Consigner:

You're going to find that iron and silver appear in your inventory more and more. What to do with it? The weight of it will only allow you to store so much in your vault before you can't put anymore in. Rather than just deleting or selling it, put it in another storage. The Consigner. After collecting about 100 ore, take it to the consigner and "sell" it for 20c a piece. This will cost you 200c for them to take it and hold it for you until someone comes along and buys it. However, since hardly anyone buys ore, this makes an excellent place to put all that heavy stuff. The fee is one-time only, which means you can pull it out at any time with no additional fees. With luck, by the time you reach 200 smelting skill and are able to smelt tier 2 resources, you could get another level out of what you have in consignment. The bars can then be either resold, or put back into storage to sell to anyone who can work it. Iron bars sell for about 12c each at the pawnbroker, so you'll be getting 1.2 silver for 100 bars assuming you had 500 ore to begin with. And if someone Does buy the ore, that's 2 silver right there for 100 ore. Not a bad haul for something you probably would have just thrown away.

Bars = Money:

At some point, you're going to want money to upgrade and buy additional equipment. Without cargo equipment, you can hold 50 bars in relative comfort, which sells to the pawnbroker for 4c a bar. Map your recall so you can just press a button when you have a good-sized haul. After you get a deluxe disk, you'll be able to drag in 600+ bars at a time, which works out to 2.4 silver per trip. At 15th level, getting that many bars takes very little time. When you get your smelting skill to 200+, you'll be able to get 2:1 when making bars. This is when you start getting some benefit from being a Miner.

When you get to 20th level, you'll be able to mine and smelt tier 2 resources. Mining silver and iron will at first only yield 1 per swing. However, at around 300 skill you'll start getting more from each swing, making you the envy of even the Armorers. In theory anyway. At this time, they get about the same benefit as Miners when it comes to ore.

Don't let that bother you though. You still get the same bonus from quarrying, so it's not like we're locked out Completely. Just gimped a bit.

What next?

At the time of this writing, the level 2 widgets can't be turned in for any benefit since the Questmasters don't know what to do with them. So you'll be pretty much left to making bars until they figure out what they are. However, if you've gotten this far, something as trivial as crippled level advancement shouldn't daunt you too much.

After all, you are a Miner.