Mining Units

Mining units are one of the key features that were introduced in the Demeter update. What are they? How do they work? How will they impact the gameplay of Dual Universe? Read on for the answers to those questions and learn more about these handy-dandy little ore vacuums.

## How do mining units work?

Let’s start with the basics.

Mining units are elements you can deploy on static constructs on the surface of planets. They need to be linked to an output container and, once started, they will autonomously dispense ore into this container without the need for you to be connected to the game.

There is one mining unit for each tier and they are large elements. Each tier of mining unit is able to mine ores of the same tier. In addition to these five large mining units, there is also a small one for tier 1 only. This special small mining unit is intended for beginners.

*A minimalist mining building with an active mining unit and a container*

These mining units work only if the mining ray you see in the screenshot above is not obstructed and can reach the ground. The mining ray has a maximum range of 50m.

Once the mining unit is deployed, linked to an output container, and in range of the ground, you can select the ore it will mine and start the machine. Once calibrated it will deliver a batch of ore in the output container every hour. To further automate the process, the output container can be designated as the entry point of an industry line. (Note: If the container is full; the mining unit will no longer collect ore, so you’ll need to empty the output containers from time to time or have them feed directly into an industry line.)

There are two primary considerations when deploying mining units. First, you need to make sure the territory where they are deployed actually holds enough ore underground and the units will need to be calibrated before they will begin collecting ore.

There are some community developed tools to help players keep track of mining unit calibration.

## Territory Pools

Various types and tiers of ore are dispersed with limited availability across Dual Universe. You won’t find them all grouped together in a particular place.

To represent that, each territory in the game can provide up to a certain volume of ore each hour. That’s what we call the ‘ore pool’. A territory scan can show the kinds of ore present on a territory tile and their yield rates in liters per hour.

*This territory is capable of providing a variety of tier 1 ore*

The image above illustrates the territory-based maximum rate for each ore on this territory. Since there’s a maximum yield per hour, adding more and more mining units becomes useless past a certain point. Each active mining unit “consumes” a part of these available resources. These territory pools represent mining rates, not a total volume of available ore. For example, if a territory has a pool of 100 l/h of a given ore and each mining unit is capable of extracting 50 l/h, then you need two mining units to maximize your extraction capacity, and any additional mining unit beyond two won't give you more yield.

Unlike the previous ‘manual mining’ system, the new ore pools are infinite. You will always be able to mine these ores at this rate for as long as you have a calibrated mining unit running here.

These territory ore pools are varied and different. On a planetary basis, this new repartition should match more or less the previous allotment for manual underground mining. There are a few changes, but basically a planet that used to contain some tier 3 ore will still contain some tile-wise though, the issuance is very different between low and high tier ores, even from territory tile to territory tile. Typically, you should find tier 1 ore in abundance on nearly every territory tile in the system, but tier 5 ores are only on a few small spots on the most distant planets.

## Active territories

For mining units to work, the territory must be active. That simply means that the territory tax for it must be paid.

### Mining rights

If you share your territory tile with your friends or organization, you might want to keep the ores for yourself or, conversely, allow only specific people the ability to operate mining units on your territories. For this purpose, we’re adding the Mining Unit Right. Without this, mining units belonging to other players are unable to access the ore pool and cannot mine on your territories.

### Adjacency Bonus

If you own several active territories near each other, the mining units working on them get an ‘adjacency bonus’ to yield a greater amount of ore beyond the ore pool in each batch. Note that the territories must be owned by the same entity. If you find a high volume ore tile it might be worth it to own and maintain a few adjacent territories.

### Extraction and Calibration

Mining units are fully autonomous but need to be calibrated to work efficiently. Each mining unit has a ‘calibration score’ and slowly loses calibration over time if kept unchecked. When the calibration score is below 100%, the mining unit will produce less ore; at 0%, it won’t produce anything at all. To remedy that, it must be calibrated.

To calibrate, you will need to enter a specific interface where you will manually probe the territory in search of underground ore. This is ‘extracting’.

*Manually extracting ore and calibrating the mining unit*

In this extracting session, you will use several tools to probe the territory tile, but you will need to keep a look at the probe battery at the same time. The goal is to find the optimal point with the best ore density that you’ll select at the end of the process. Depending on the quality of the location, this will have two effects:

* It will increase the calibration score so that the mining unit can continue to do its job.
* It will also extract a few ore rocks in the process and those will pop to the surface of the tile beneath the mining unit. These may be harvested manually at your convenience.
* While the calibration surface ore does not expire there is a finite amount per tile that will be spawned until the player harvests them
* The volume of surface ore that calibration yields is not restricted to the size (small or large) mining unit used, only the accuracy of the target density.
* With target density of 100% T1 surface ore will spawn 2400 L of the selected ore type without skills and 4200 L with max calibration skills, higher tier or will spawn less for the same target density.

The talents that affect calibration ore spawning on the surface after calibration are below

Calibration is not unlimited. Each player generates calibration charges at the rate of one charge every few hours. You can use your charges on the mining units owned by other players or organizations as long as you have the rights needed to access them.

Finally, a single mining unit cannot be extracted twice in a row. There’s a 24-hour cooldown period before calibrating it again. The upside is that mining units will not lose calibration for two days after being calibrated.

## Mining Unit Talents

Talents to boost mining unit use

* mining unit efficiency, on element deploy
* base mining rate, on element deploy
* speed at which your character will regenerate calibration charges
* maximum mining charges your character can hold
* amount of ore extracted when calibrating

## Mining Unit Lua

Added Lua functions :

* [string] getStatus() : Returns the current status of the mining unit ("STOPPED", "STALLED", "RUNNING").
* [float] getRemainingTime() : Returns the time remaining on the drilling process.
* [int] getActiveOre() : Returns the id of the current selected resource.
* [table] getOrePools() : Returns the list of resources pool on the territory. Each resource pool object of the list contains ‘id’, ‘available’ and ‘maximum’ fields.
* [float] getBaseRate() : Returns the base production rate of the mining unit.
* [float] getEfficiency() : Returns the production efficiency of the mining unit.
* [float] getAdjacencyBonus() : Returns the territory's production adjacency bonus factor. This value will only be updated when a new batch is started.
* [float] getCalibrationRate() : Returns the current calibration rate of the mining unit.
* [float] getOptimalRate() : Returns the optimal calibration rate of the mining unit.
* [float] getProductionRate() : Returns the production rate of the mining unit.
* [vec3] getLastExtractionPosition() : Returns the position of the extracted ore during the last calibration in world coordinates.
* [int] getLastExtractingPlayerId() : Returns the ID of the last player who calibrated the mining unit.
* [float] getLastExtractionTime() : Returns the time in seconds since the last calibration of the mining unit.
* [float] getLastExtractedVolume() : Returns the amount of ore extracted during the last calibration.
* [int] getLastExtractedOre() : Returns the id of the extracted ore during the last calibration.

Added Lua events :

* [event] statusChanged([string] status) : Emitted when the mining unit status is changed. Provide the new status.
* [event] completed([int] oreId, [float] amount) : Emitted when the mining unit completes a batch. Provide the item ID of the mined ore and the amount mined in the batch.
* [event] calibrated([int] oreId, [float] amount, [float] rate) : Emitted when the mining unit is calibrated. Provide the item ID of the extracted ore, the amount extracted and the new calibration rate.

Added new Lua Item API :

* [table] system.getItem([int] id): Return the item table corresponding to the given item ID :
* [int] id : The ID of the item.
* [string] name : The name used to define the item.
* [string] displayName : The name of the item used in the game.
* [string] locDisplayName : The name of the item used in the game in the language of your game.
* [string] displayNameWithSize : The name of the item used in the game with the size (XS,S,M,L).
* [string] locDisplayNameWithSize : The name of the item used in the game with the size (XS,S,M,L) in the language of your game.
* [string] description : The description of the item in English.
* [string] locDescription : The description of the item in the language of your game.
* [string] type : The type of item.
* [float] unitMass : The unit mass of the item.
* [float] unitVolume : The unit volume of the item.
* [int] tier : The tier of the item (1 to 5).
* [string] size : The size of the item (xs, s, m, l).
* [string] iconPath : The path of the item's icon in the game files (usable on the screens).

Taken from the Official Post by: NQ-Deckard on 11/16/2021 - **DEVBLOG: MINING UNITS 101**

1. ↑ https://www.ephranor.com/du-mu-tracker