Dowsing

Ore Basics

There are a number of different ores available in Egypt: Iron, Copper, Aluminium, Tin, Zinc, Lead, Limestone, Silver, Gold and Lithium. (And some special cases: Magnesium and Uranium.) The ores are spread out over the entire area. Most ores come as ore veins: either long, sometimes narrow bands of ore, or square blobs. Aluminium and Tin are exceptions to the rule. They only can be found at the ends of Iron or Copper veins and form the so called "caps" of these veins. Ore veins that can have caps always have two, one at either end.

Here's a more detailed list of how ores appear in Egypt:

• Iron ore is formost found in veins, 8 coords wide and usually around 150 coords long, although longer and (much) shorter veins can be found. Iron veins usually run from the Nortwest to the Southeast. Iron veins that run in this direction are capped by Copper. Sometimes an Iron vein can be found that runs in the opposite direction, i.e. Southwest to Northeast. Those veins are capped by Aluminium. Iron can also be found as cap on a Copper vein.
• Copper ore is formost found in veins too. Their length and width is about the same as Iron veins. The normal direction for Copper veins is Southwest to Northeast, and are capped by Iron. Rarer are Copper veins that run from Northwest to Southeast: these are capped by Tin. Copper can also be found as cap on Iron veins.
• Aluminium ore can only be found in the form of caps on Iron veins, that run from Southwest to Northeast. The caps are usually circular and 12 coords wide.
• Tin ore can only be found as caps on Copper veins, that run from Northwest to Southeast. The caps are also circular and 12 coords wide.
• Zinc ore is found as narrow (about 4 coords wide) veins. Some veins are short, others are reported to be extremely long. Zinc is one of the rarer metals. Known veins run either straight North-South or slightly Southwest-Northeast. Zinc veins have no caps.
• (Update)Lead ore is found is huge blobs measuring insane numbers (app. 150-150) Lead is pretty rare too.
• Limestone is found in 32 coords by 32 coords blobs. It's less rare than Zinc and Lead, but by no means as common as Iron and Copper. Limestone is rather a mineral than an ore.
• Only a few Silver vein(s) are known at this moment. They are long and very narrow, and run almost straight East-West or slightly Northwest-Southeast. Silver veins have no caps. Silver is an odd one out in the list, since a Silver mine yields pure Silver, not Silver ore.
• Three Gold veins are known at this moment. They are long and narrow and zig-zag. Gold Ore can only be mined, but Gold (not the ore) can also be gathered on all shores by panning.
• Lithium also comes in square fields. Sadly that's all I know about Lithium.
• Magnesium ore doesn't occur naturally, but was planted by the Dev Team as part of an event.
• Uranium ore is only a rumour so far and probably isn't present in Egypt at the moment.
• Dirt should be in this list too: when there is no ore on the spot where you build a mine, you will be the proud owner of a mine that yields Dirt.

Dowsing Basics

There is no way to directly see on the surface what kind of ore is underneath, so the only way to find the ores is by dowsing. Dowsing is a skill that is taught at the Universities of Art and Music. With Dowsing, one can try to detect what's directly under one's feet. You will see the results only for the little square you're standing on, not an entire coord. Dirt and ores, or 2 kinds of ores, can be found in one and the same coord. Which ores you can detect depends on your Perception. When detecting an ore type requires a higher Perception than you have, the system will tell you that you found dirt. Building a mine on a spot that has an ore you can't detect will not yield a Dirt mine though!

Here's the Perception list:

• At Perc 0, Iron will show as unknown ore and all other ores show as dirt.
• At Perc 1, Iron is reported, Copper will show as unknown ore and all others as dirt again.
• At Perc 2, Iron and Copper are reported, Aluminium will show as unknown ore, all others as dirt.
• At Perc 3, Limestone and Zinc will show as unknown ore. (Lower ores are reported, higher ores show as dirt.)
• At Perc 4, Lead will show as unknown ore. (and for some, Tin shows up as unknown ore.)
• At Perc 5, Tin, Lithium and Silver will show as unknown ore.
• At Perc 6, Magnesium will show as unknown ore.
• At Perc 7, Gold will show as unknown ore.
• At Perc 8, Gold will show as Gold.

At the moment, your Perception can theoretically raised to 9. You can gain Perception points from Gastronomy, Winetasting and Beertasting (one point at 100 in either, another point at 200 and a third point at 250). Perception can also be temporarily raised by eating certain foods. However, the foods are expensive to make and don't last long in general. That means they are only suited for specialized dowsing, for instance to find the extent of a cap.

The speed of dowsing is determined by Focus. At Focus 0, the time between two dowsing attempts is 2 minutes. Focus may be raised by solving puzzles built as part of Tests of Thought. A combined Percpetion/Focus recipe is available too for specialized dowsing

Finding an Ore Vein

First, find an area that isn't dowsed intensively yet. That means: no veins charted in the Shared Dowsing Map, and no mines built in the area. Often people use bonfires to trace out veins that they found. When you see a long line of bonfires, then someone else probably dowsed there before.

Next, choose a spot to start from and dowse. You'll probably hit dirt, but no worries! Then move a bit and dowse again. Since most veins run diagonally, it's a very good idea to move straight N-S or straight E-W. You'll have the best chance to intersect a vein that way. It's not necessary to dowse every coord. Since the most common veins are 8 coords wide, the actual width when you hit them diagonally is 11-12 coords. So dowsing every 11-12 coords will guarantee you that you won't miss the common veins. I myself rather count in steps than in coords. 10 steps (while running) make 4 coords. So when I move straight N-S or E-W I usually walk 30 steps before I dowse again. If you keep going straight, you'll hit ore sooner or later.

A way to see where you already dowsed is to drop a tadpole when you found dirt. The tadpoles disappear after 2 hours, but that is usually long enough for a dowsing session. When you hit ore, it's a good idea to build a bonfire on the spot. BUT, to avoid cluttering up the area and annoying people, make sure you make your bonfires public so that everyone can remove it if it bothers them.

Dowsing the Vein

When you hit ore, don't build a mine right away. It's a good idea to get an idea first of the layout of the vein and plan your mines after. Suppose you hit Iron or Copper. These veins run diagonally. Walk 20 steps (that is 8 coords) in a northwest, southwest, norteast or southeast direction, and dowse. If you hit ore again, it's usually clear in which direction the vein runs. Proceed now by walking 20 steps in the direction where you think you will hit ore again, and dowse.

There are some peculiarities that occur in the run of veins. First, sometimes the vein bends a bit. But that is always at an obtuse angle, so if that happens, move a bit to the right or left, like 12 steps, and try again. Ore veins often bend a bit at the ends, so finding a bend is usually a sign that you're near the cap.

Another peculiarity is the interruption of a vein by circular blobs of dirt. Such a circular blob can cut into the vein and make it narrower at some point. It also happens that the blob covers the entire width of the vein. In that case the vein seems to end prematurely. However, a bit further you'll be able to pick up the ore vein again. The iron or copper vein doesn't end until you reached the cap!

I advise you to enter the coords of the ore spots that you find in the Shared Dowsing Map. It gives a nice clear picture of the position of the veins.

Planning Mines

Building 2 mines too close together, even if the system allows you to, isn't a good idea. Those 2 mines will cut into the same ore square, won't yield more than one mine on that square and collapse often. So, the way to go is to build your mines on different ore squares. That goes too if you place for instance an iron mine and a copper mine on the same square. So avoid this at all cost!

Ore squares measure 16x16 coords. There's an easy method to see where your next mine should be:

• write down the coords of the center of the first mine. Divide each coord by 16, and drop the decimals.
• now check the coords of the next spot. Divide each by 16 too and drop the decimals again.
• now compare the divided coords of each spot to each other. If both the E-W and N-S divided coords are the same, you're still on the same ore square. But if either of them is different, you reached the next ore square and can place another mine.

Using this method will allow you to make optimal use of the vein.

Dowsing a Cap

Copper caps and iron caps are usually pretty small, around 8 coords in diameter. Usually it's not worth the trouble to dowse them properly, unless you really need to find a way to fit 2 mines there.

Tin and Aluminium caps however, are larger: around 12 coords in diameter. It is theoretically possible to fit 4 mines on a cap. But to make an attempt to do so, there is quite a lot of dowsing left to do. It's usually a good idea to place a kitchen near the cap that's filled with Focus or Perception+Focus food.

Caps are usually circular. If the cap is on a mountain slope, it can also be ellipsoid or pear-shaped. What you need to do first is to find the northernmost, southernmost, easternmost and westermost point of the circle that yields ore. Write down the coords for these spots and do the math (see above). This will tell you how many different ore sqares there are in the cap and thus how many mines you can place. If all "edges" of the circle fall into the same ore square, then it's tough luck. Don't try to place more than one mine in that case. But usually the cap is located into 2 or 3 different ore squares, and if you're very lucky, 4. A valuable aid is the Cartographer's Cam (from the Utility->Camera menu). It gives you a topview, allows you to zoom in and out quite a bit, and the top of the screen always represents the north.

Finding the Next Vein

Once you found one vein, it's usually easy to find another one. If you walk straight east or west from either of the caps of a vein that runs NW-SE, you'll usually hit another vein fast. Or, if the vein runs NE-SW, walk straight north or south from one of the caps.

Finding Rare Ores

You'll need luck and patience to find a rare ore. You will also need pretty high perception, so best work on that first. However, I can also give some more tips.

For Copper and Tin: Dowse in a fresh area. Track as many iron and copper veins as you can. The Shared Dowsing Map is a very handy tool again. Sooner or later you'll run into a vein that runs the "wrong" way and you'll find Aluminium or Tin.

For Limestone, Lead, and Lithium (?): Dowse long, straight lines, either N-S or E-W. Since the fields of these ores are square and measure 32x32 coords, dowsing once every 32 coords (or 80 steps) is enough to make sure you don't miss it when it's there.

For Zinc, Silver and Gold: Plain luck I guess. The only advice I can give here is to get your Perception up as high as you can, and dowse wherever you can, whenever you can.

Some do's and do-not's

• Always dowse whenever you can, and carry some tadpoles and wood with you, wherever you go.
• If you build bonfires to mark the veins you dowsed, make them public.
• Don't build bonfires or mines in, or close to, someone else's camp, unless they give you permission to do so.
• Whenever you come across another player that is dowsing a vein, ask their permission first before you start dowsing that same vein.
• Build mines according to your needs.
• Don't build a mine whenever you find ore, because this clutters up the landscape and will leave little room for new players to build their own mines.
• Have fun!

Dowsing GIS Application

DarthBobo has written a dowsing visualization tool in Java. You can download the jar at http://www.purplefrog.com/~thoth/atitd/ . It stores your data in a deadly plain and dull text file. It helps you visualize mine interference zones and collapse grids.

(See also: Mining, Ore Smelting)

--- What's the location of the shared Dowsing map? There used to be one maintained by Thanotopsis but he stopped playing over a year ago, and it became less useful. Is there another more current one? - Var-LeTha