Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Romeofalling]

I can never seem to find bit'coal or lignite, and I'm wondering if it is my embark preferences, my mining habits, or what. What's your secret to locating the stash of burning goodness? Or, if you're a magma fiend, when do you decide to start digging down?

[G-Flex]

Each of them only exists in sedimentary layers, so if you're in highly volcanic regions, you're less likely to find them. Hope that helps?

[Quantumtroll]

I have never found coal or lignite.  I use charcoal and tend to slash whatever forest the biome provides rather quickly (for glass and pottery if not metalworking), breach the caverns as quickly as possible for an underground tree farm, and start harvesting the caverns.  By the time I realize I have a fuel supply problem, industry has usually ground to a halt and I have to start working on relocating to (or pumping up) some magma with only a trickle of coal...

[Romeofalling]

Each of them only exists in sedimentary layers, so if you're in highly volcanic regions, you're less likely to find them. Hope that helps?

Is this a logic problem? If fuel exists in sedimentary layers, then do all sedimentary layers have fuel in them? When do you decide to go looking at another Z-level?

(Right now, I'm digging through a rock salt layer and finding a ton of hematite, gold and gems. Just no fuel. Granted, it is only year two, but I usually get frustrated by the time I hit about 50 dwarves.)

By the time I realize I have a fuel supply problem, industry has usually ground to a halt and I have to start working on relocating to (or pumping up) some magma with only a trickle of coal...

It's good to know that I'm not the only one who leaves a wake of mountain husks behind me.

[G-Flex]

Is this a logic problem? If fuel exists in sedimentary layers, then do all sedimentary layers have fuel in them?

I said that it only exists in sedimentary layers, not that it's guaranteed in all of them. It can occur in any sedimentary stone layer, and only those.

When do you decide to go looking at another Z-level?

When you feel you've pressed your luck, I guess. I don't think there's a way to guess what's around the corner on a z-level unless you're looking for a vein you know is too big to fit in the area you're searching, which isn't the case here.

[Kogut]

I suggest to try magma as fuel. Just dig down.

[Matoro]

I have seen lignite and bituminous coal in beaches. Sedimentary layers usually have coal.

[Tharwen]

Don't forget the renewable, easily accessible, elf-angering fuel supply growing atop every embark site

[FearfulJesuit]

Getting enough charcoal for a metalworking industry is just larger-scale than coal mining. Dig out every soil Z-level and leave them be- you'll get several Z-levels that just grow trees.

[acetech09]

Train your legendary miners on the soil layers - wait 2 years. After 2 years you'll have more wood than you know what to do with, if you have 3 or more layers.

[melphel]

Don't forget the renewable, easily accessible, elf-angering fuel supply growing atop every embark site

Not quite every embark.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I usually spend the first few seasons preparing easy trade goods for the first caravan, then I dig for magma.

[Necro910]

I can never seem to find bit'coal or lignite, and I'm wondering if it is my embark preferences, my mining habits, or what. What's your secret to locating the stash of burning goodness? Or, if you're a magma fiend, when do you decide to start digging down?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

MAGMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA Immediately. If it is taking too long, I go with charcoal as a temporary substitute.

[khearn]

I vaguely recall seeing some lignite or bituminous coal in one embark. Or maybe I'm just imagining it. I don't even bother looking for it anymore. It's as scarce as hen's teeth.

As others have said, underground tree farms for the win. I don't think anyone mentioned that you have to breach the caverns for at least a moment before things will start growing, though. Gotta let the spores out. But you can seal them right back up and things will keep growing in your farms.

I also buy every log from every caravan and request every type of wood from the Mountainhome.

But once you get magma shops set up, the need for charcoal drops way, way down.