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Author Topic: How to use the finder to search for a specific stone, ore, fuel, or gem  (Read 7516 times)

Brandstone

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After the change to the embark screen details made finding my favorite stone layer difficult, I had an idea. What if I commented out the aquifer tag, then added an aquifer tag to only the stone I was looking for? I could then use the finder to search for exactly what I wanted, and not have to waste time embarking on sites that might have what I wanted to check for it. It worked! Although a successful find does require regeneration to return the aquifer tags to normal You don't even have to regenerate your world between switching your aquifer tags as long as you don't embark. Just find the site you want with the modified aquifer tag and note the location(a screenshot works well), then back out to the main menu and switch the aquifer tags back to normal. I do recommend using Notepad ++ for this and opening all the inorganic files at the same time, since it's 'replace all in all opened documents' makes all the tag replacement easier. Also, I noticed jade is now appearing in some layers, unless DF prospector is lying to me.

Edit: Added the awesome info from gtmattz.

gtmattz

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You dont need to regen to remove aquifers, just find your site, DONT EMBARK but remember where it is, hit esc and abort, change your aquifer tags, go back to start game and embark on the area you found, this time without the aquifers.  As long as you do not embark the aquifers are not generated, so you can remove them from the raws in your specific save folder before you embark to save the time regenerating the world etc.
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Quote from: Hyndis
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Brandstone

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You dont need to regen to remove aquifers, just find your site, DONT EMBARK but remember where it is, hit esc and abort, change your aquifer tags, go back to start game and embark on the area you found, this time without the aquifers.  As long as you do not embark the aquifers are not generated, so you can remove them from the raws in your specific save folder before you embark to save the time regenerating the world etc.
Neat, but what about re-adding the aquifer tags? Will that work without a regen?

gtmattz

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The way aquifer tiles work is that they do not 'appear' until they have been 'uncovered'.  Now, in older versions that meant that you either had to dig into an aquifer tile, but if 'something of note' existed below the aquifer, that embark tiles worth of aquifer would be uncovered immediately upon embark.  When you remove the aquifer tag, all uncovered aquifer tiles lose their aquifer tag, but any that had been uncovered are permanently aquifers regardless of changes.  The same works in reverse, any exposed non-aquifer tiles of any specific material, if changed to have the aquifer tag, will not become aquifers, but any of those tiles that have not been uncovered would.  Too bad that this is all moot in 2010, but it helps get an understanding of what is going on here.

Now, in DF2010, every embark tile has something of note under it, so the entirety of your map is 'uncovered' (not the same as exposed, it is more a case of the engine actively tracking the tiles), that means that if you had aquifers enabled when you initially embarked, all layers that had the aquifer tag will retain that tag.  What this also means is that if you do not embark on the area until you make your changes, they will take effect, whether adding or removing the tags.  The only reason that it would seem you need to regen is because of the mechanic I outlined above.  I hope this makes some amount of sense, if not just say and I will try to explain better.

But in short, you can generate a world with everything normal, then go into the saves raws and fiddle with your aquifer tags like in your OP, use the finder to find a site, then without embarking(cancel out of the embark process), go back and change the raws to where they were, then go back and embark on that spot you found.
« Last Edit: March 05, 2011, 02:57:43 pm by gtmattz »
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Quote from: Hyndis
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Brandstone

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That makes sense. As long as I don't embark on the site I can keep the same world throughout the aquifer changes.

gtmattz

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That makes sense. As long as I don't embark on the site I can keep the same world throughout the aquifer changes.

Yep, that is the tl;dr version of what I was trying to explain lol  ;D
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j0nas

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Warning: this thread may contain GENIUS!
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Would this only work for a single type of material, or could it be used to ensure your site has everything you want? I keep getting screwed and having either iron OR coal; but never both at the same time.
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Button

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The aquifer finder is binary, so in order to check if a given site had two different types of thing, you'd need to mod all iron ores to aquifer, find a promising spot, abort, change the raws to put aquifer in coal only, and check the spot again.

I believe - correct me if I'm wrong gtmattz - that the aquifer method of prospecting before embark will produce a lot of false negatives. In high drainage biomes, even stones with [AQUIFER] tags don't generate aquifer; and I believe aquifers never gen in mountain biomes.
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Urist Da Vinci

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Learn how to find Iron ore & sedimentary flux stone with RAW edits

The method I describe in that thread allows you to find a single site that has both iron ore and flux stone.