Some data from visiting Finndi in the RSO area (I'm in ND) have suggested that one of two things might be going on: either there might be two different flavors of SB- divided on a dimension we're not yet aware of, or perhaps tin loads (and other loads?) leave some remnants behind that can impact future loads. See my data from Finndi's mine below.
I’ve separated things a bit now—I’m dividing a section named “collated results” from my raw data for the purpose of collaboration. This way I can keep my raw data... well... raw. Heh.
In any case, feel free to add your own result data to a new section at the bottom of this page, and collate your combined results into the combined table higher up. My own raw data, I will also add underneath the “significant findings” section. Don’t worry about waiting on any additions—go right ahead, as I’ve a copy of all of my raw notes at home and will add it from there.
I would ask that you be as careful as possible about not including data where you are not sure of the crystal count, or at the very least annotating all of that data with an asterisk.
There’s also a section for discussion comments at the bottom of the page. If you have included data in that section, I ask that you move it up into the individual data section.
All of my results are done using the most precise measurements possible. If I am not sure how many crystals of what type are in a rock, I will mark the data with an asterisk to indicate possible error. At all other times, the number of crystals has been counted including using so-called ‘x-ray vision’.
My current process is to smelt single ore stones, and to record all crystals in the input stone and all details about the resulting output. I’m doing this for every stone I pull from my mine, one at a time. If I see a stone I’ve seen before, I repeat the process (because if the result comes back different, it could indicate an erroneous measurement of an earlier stone, or it might indicate a new dimension for distinguishing crystals which we’ve not yet discovered.)
After I have collected a good amount of data on single-stone smelts, I plan to smelt multiple stones at a time and cross check with the single stone smelts to determine in what ways the number of stones in the input is significant.
All data to this point is on a smelting pot. Future data on a craft furnace will be kept separate.
I use the standard notation from the Smelting Combinations page to describe crystals, and a simple text description of the smelting outputs. A single stone is noted like “3SB-O 2GS+D” to denote a stone with “three sky/black flat protruding crystals and two green/spotted wide deep crystals”. Multiple stones will be noted as “first stone, second stone”. The smelting process is written as “inputs ⇒ outputs”. So “5SB-O ⇒ 1 iron” indicates that I smelted five sky/black flat protruding crystals and the result was 1 iron.
Note that I am uncertain about D/O classifications, so that data should be taken with a grain of salt. I have not yet seen anything suggesting that this distinction is an independent variable, but rather believe it to correlate with other distinctions.
I keep my data in semi-tabular format to make it easy to keep track of what minerals have been seen together.
If you need to add a column for a new crystal, feel free. The order is alphabetically by color name, with - preceding +.
| GC- | GM+ | GS+ | NM- | NM+ | PM- | SB- | SB+ | SC+ | SS+ | TS+ | ⇒ | Result |
| ⇒ | nothing | |||||||||||
| 2SB+D | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 7SB+O | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 13SB+O | ⇒ | 2 iron | ||||||||||
| 1SB-D | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 1SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 2SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 2SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 2SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 4SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron*? | ||||||||||
| (2+2)SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||||
| 5SB-O | ⇒ | 2 iron | ||||||||||
| 5SB-O | ⇒ | 2 iron | ||||||||||
| 3PM-D | ⇒ | 1 sand | ||||||||||
| 4PM-D | 2SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 5PM-D | 4SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 2PM-D | (2+2)SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 13PM-D | 4SB-O | ⇒ | 1 sand | |||||||||
| 6PM-D | 6SC+D | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 7NM+D | 2SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 2NM-D | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 2NM-O | 2TS+D | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 3NM-O | 7TS+O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 4NM-O | 6SB+O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 4NM-O | 9SB+O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 2NM+D | (1+3)SB+O | ⇒ | 2 iron | |||||||||
| 4NM+D | 8SC+D | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 2GS+O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 3GS+D | 3SB-O | 4SS+D | ⇒ | 1 iron | ||||||||
| 4GS+O | 3SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 6GS+O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 6GS+O | 3SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 6GS+O | 3SB-O | ⇒ | 1 iron | |||||||||
| 6GS+O | 2PM-D | ⇒ | 1 sand | |||||||||
| 7GS+O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 7GS+O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 7GS+O | 4SB-O | ⇒ | 2 iron | |||||||||
| 8GS+D | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 8GS+O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | ||||||||||
| 8GS+O | 2SB-O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | |||||||||
| 9GS+O | 1SB-O | ⇒ | 1 dirt | |||||||||
| 5GM+O | 9GS+O | ⇒ | 2 dirt | |||||||||
| 1GC-O | 7SB+O | ⇒ | 1 iron |
This shows that a pure load of between 1 and 4 SB-O crystals in a single stone in a smelting pot produces 1 iron, but 5 crystals will produce 2 iron. Once we get data on larger numbers of pure crystals, we’ll begin to get more of an idea how much is needed.
New information indicates that the 4SB-O ⇒ 1 iron may be erroneous. I look forward to smelting this load again.
Here we see that the two most common iron ore crystals, SB- and SB+, are not in fact identical. In fact, it appears that SB+ (the larger of the two) is less efficient than SB- at iron output per crystal. Note, however, that SB+ also tends to appear in larger cluster sizes than SB- does.
This is very interesting indeed. It appears that GS+, which normally produces dirt, might contain enough iron to increase the output of 4SB- over the limit into producing two iron instead of one. This leads to the suspicion that each crystal type might be composed of various basic minerals. Perhaps in this case, the combined result is that not enough "dirt" is produced by the SB- and GS+ together to override the iron, but enough iron comes from the GS+ that it bolsters the SB-’s normal output.
This may also possibly be a measurement error. We’ll know if we see it duplicated.
Note that I've kept these in time order, in case earlier smelts impact later smelts. Here you see what I mean about the strange SB- &8658; tin smelts, which could either be that order sensitivity or a new observable (or unobservable) feature of crystals that we have not yet identified.
As an aside i just did 2 tests using Craft Furnace
Posting mine at home-- Mining (There are some interesting results here you guys may want to check out)
Add things below here if you’d like to comment on the work. Add your own data above under Individual Data.
| SB- | PM- | YS+D | YM+D | SC+D | NM+D | RB+ | TS+O | iron | sand | tungsten |
| 4 | 5 | 1 | ||||||||
| 4 | 13 | 1 | ||||||||
| 7 | 1 | |||||||||
| 8 | 4 | 1 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | 1 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | 13 | 2 | |||||||
| 3 | 3 | 1 | ||||||||
| 3 | 1 | |||||||||
| 4(2+2) | 1 | |||||||||
| 3 | 5 | 1 | ||||||||
| 4(1+3) | 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 4(2+2) | 2 | 1 | ||||||||
| 4 | 1 | |||||||||
| 9(7+2) | 2 | |||||||||
| 13 | 1 | |||||||||
| 4 | 3 | 4 | 2 | |||||||
| 9 | 7 | 1 |
So *if* numbers like that were the case, you could add 5 SB- and 5 RC+ together, which would give you 0.5iron, 1tungsten, ... etc -- then the smelting pot has an efficiency, maybe it has alterations to how it effects certain metal types and/or combinatiosn (perhaps the rare metals have large negative numbers in most crystal types, but the precious furnace ignores negative numbers, and only uses positives? This would explain the result some people have where the precious gives out metal types they didn't expect at all) -- and in this case, that smelting would give some number of tungsten, depending on the efficiency of the furnace...
Do you want other people to add to your results? Or are you keeping your results seperate specifically to avoid contamination from people who aren't as hardcore about making sure the number of crystals is right? (and you must use a lot of cc! :)
Leetah: Yes, this is definitely a model I've been thinking about, and which this style of investigation should uncover in time. As I noted above, feel free to include your results, but do try to keep the data as clean as possible. And if you even think there might be crystals that you didn't spot, mark your data with an asterisk so we all know.
And no, the charcoal costs aren't too bad. I'm making it as I go—I periodically do a wood run while waiting for the smelter when I already have a few ore stones out, then make 7 wood bonfires for the charcoal. Inefficient, but fast enough for my needs.
Leetah: and in all honesty, I wouldn't be shocked if the actual values could change region to region somewhat (+/- 0.2 perhaps). There seem to be an abnormal number of descrepencies since the last mining change and they appear to be somewhat regional, but time will tell on that. Also, please everyone NOTE YOUR LOCATION (it doesn't have to be exact to the coord but vague area incase it is regional)