Late Game Economy

[b0rsuk]

Alpaca wool is practically free resource. Alpacas aren't that food demanding, and a legendary parka I made has a listed value of 5040 silver.

[keylocke]

I've been thinking of a way to mine minerals from the ground. Because mineral exhaustion in long games is a real problem.

awesome.

It would be cool if metiorite strike was a random event thet deposited a 10×10 block of ore rich rocks. Simmilar to the mod that shrup suggested. Or mayby metal bugs that poop out metal every once in a while.

this could be one of the available options to get new ores

Instead of mindless mines, I would suggest give ability to controlled collapse of mountains. Right now Some mountain roofs are irremovable.
If we could collapse mountain into tunnel, lowering it height a bit and creating layer of what ever for as to mine again that will be mach more interesting and still finite amount of resources. That mach more interesting then plain invisible mines and probably easy to do in existent system.

^the concept is good, but i disagree about the execution.

-thin roofs doesn't drop ore.
-thick roofs should remain thick roofs.
-if you mine below a thick roof without support and it collapses, there's a probability that some of those rocks contain ore.

pros :
-you get unlimited source of ores (but ores are random)
-it's not automatic. people still needs to mine rocks/ores
cons :
-mining becomes dangerous due to possible roof collapse (mining is dangerous in real life)
-you might need to shoot/grenade a wall support, instead of mining it, to force collapse the roof. this would make it less dangerous to the miner. problem is that it would be micromanagey.

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edit :

i think this might be a good time to reintroduce the suggestion to add coal as an ore. since coal would be a good substitute for fuel instead of using wood. (if unlimited ore from collapsing roof is introduced)

also on a separate but related note. if the game eventually does add coal as an ore (for fuel). it can also be used for crafting and we can rename plasteel into steel, and call steel as iron.

this way we can craft "steel" by combining coal + iron as an additional recipe in the smelter.

[Wex]

Alpaca wool is practically free resource. Alpacas aren't that food demanding, and a legendary parka I made has a listed value of 5040 silver.

Because you didn't try Thrumbofur.
I made a legendary parka that was over 30000.

[Shurp]

And you sold it to a passing visitor who just happened to be carrying 30000 silver?

[Wex]

Nope, they always pay a fifth of what's worth.
But I got a lot of gold from an exotic goods trader.

[b0rsuk]

Alpaca wool is practically free resource. Alpacas aren't that food demanding, and a legendary parka I made has a listed value of 5040 silver.

Because you didn't try Thrumbofur.
I made a legendary parka that was over 30000.

I have, just not in this colony. And I haven't sold the parka yet - lack of exotic traders.

You can't breed thrumbos for fur, but you can shave alpacas. 5040 (nominal) from a common renewable material is good. Basically all you need is plants.

Animals are a good source of income, low maintenance and don't have issues like toxic fallout or sunlamps. My current colony has 9 adult bears (almost fully trained) and a baby bear sells for 120 silver. They are also easier to sell than exotic goods - caravans buy them too. My whole animal farm consumes a little over 1000 hay in winter.