We've been unhappy with the state of prospecting for a while. It's very much an automated process at this point and it's very hard to participate more casually. With that in mind, we've made some changes to how this whole aspect of the mining system works. Here is the rundown:

- SURVEY REGION has been removed.

- You now must PROSPECT HIRE [COMM] at a mining camp. Said camp will then send out a crew which will look around the area for lodes for you:
* This costs five thousand gold and takes fifteen minutes for a general search, and has a cooldown of one hour.
* This costs fifteen hundred gold and takes five minutes for a specific commodity search, and carries a cooldown of twenty minutes.

- After your crew returns, you'll receive reports PROSPECT REPORTS of all commodities that were found. These reports become invalid as lodes get built on.

- If you have a report, lodes for that room will now show up on look. You can PROSPECT HERE in a room you hold a report for (or that has a mine) to see the old information that prospect conveyed. This should cover all cases where this is needed.

- You can PROSPECT YIELD <report number> TO <other player> in your room. This will give them that specific report, so you can still collaborate in order to claim mines.

- Naturally, you will require a report to know where a lode is to build a mine upon it.

We believe overall this system will be much healthier. We'll be keeping a close eye on it. Next on the mining list: STRONGHOLDS!


Penned by My hand on the 22nd of Lupar, in the year 940 AF.