Output of an adamantine mine?

[Pyrex]

Why is the actual volume of material pulled out of the ground relevant?
What you need to know is how much useful (refined) adamantine the mine is producing each week.

Step1: Hire lots of people with the 'Profession(Miner)' skill.
->Assuming each miner performs a 'Take 10' each week, they'll
mine (5 + 1/2 Skill Bonus) GP worth of adamantine ore each week.

Step2: Hire lots of people with the 'Craft(Metalworking)' skill to refine.
->Have the crafters use the xGP worth of ore produced in Step1 as
the raw materials to produce 3xGP worth of refined adamantine bars.
Assuming that refining adamantine is DC20, a crafter with +10 to Craft
can refine 13.3GP worth of ore into 40GP of refined adamantine each week.

The volume/weight of 40gp worth of adamantine is not relevant.
What's relevant is that it takes 1000gp of adamantine to make a weapon
or 5000gp worth to make Plate mail. (working downward from the market
price modifier)

This has the side-effect of making mining realistically slow, painful and low-profit-margin.

 

[Silveras]

You might also want to check Expeditious Retreat's web site; in the Community Support section is a PDF with guidelines for detailed handling of mines.

 

[The Sigil]

Why is the actual volume of material pulled out of the ground relevant?
What you need to know is how much useful (refined) adamantine the mine is producing each week.
{snip}
This has the side-effect of making mining realistically slow, painful and low-profit-margin.

heh... this illustrates my biggest problem with WotC's Craft rules.

The method you mentioned also works (identically, I might add) for a copper mine, a silver mine, a gold mine, a platinum mine, a gem mine, an aluminum mine, a tin mine, etc. - by which I mean that the value of material pulled from a given mine each week does not depend at ALL on the intrinsic value of the material itself.

If you have 50 miners in an adamantine mine that produce (pulling a number out of my backside; let's just say a check result of 20 - not at all out of the question since it just requires a 1st-level miner with Skill Focus, 4 Ranks of Mining, Masterwork Tools, and a 14 ability score - not out of the question by any stretch, and certainly achievable by level 3, since the extra 2 ranks he gains between levels one and three mean he needs just a 10 ability score or no masterwork tools) or 1000 gp of adamantine (less than a pound, no?) per week, those same 50 miners in a silver mine would produce...

1000 gp per week (1000 pounds or 20 pounds each); those same miners in a copper mine would produce...

1000 gp per week (10,000 pounds or 200 pounds each), those same miners in an iron mine would produce...

1000 gp per week (100,000 pounds or a ridiculous 1 ton each), those same miners in a coal mine would produce...

1000 gp per week (closing on 1,000,000 pounds or a stupidly unrealistic amount of over 1.4 tons of coal per miner per day), those same miners in a diamond mine would produce...

1000 gp per week (i.e., 1/5th of a stone)... etc

The Craft and Profession rules are HORRIBLY broken when it comes to commodities.

Of course, you could limit the total volume of stuff taken out of a mine, but then you have the ridiculous prospect of a mine with 1.4 tons of coal being "mined out" in a single day by a single (1st-level) miner!!!

Bottom line... don't use the Core Craft/Profession rules for this... get some other system or it gets really ridiculous really quickly.

--The Sigil

 

[Ferox4]

....but then you have the ridiculous prospect of a mine with 1.4 tons of coal being "mined out" in a single day by a single (1st-level) miner!!!

Just cuz the dwarves in YOUR world are wussies.......now MY dwarves could have that done before lunch.......

Seriously though, you make a terrific point, Sigil. The PCs in one of my campaigns are getting ready to start a mining prospect for durneth (FR) - an even more rare and valuable commodity than adamantine. I will clearly have to develop a better system for their operation.

 

[Crothian]

doesn't the second edition Colplete Guide to Dwarves have mining rules in it?

 

[The Sigil]

Of course, you could limit the total volume of stuff taken out of a mine, but then you have the ridiculous prospect of a mine with 1.4 tons of coal being "mined out" in a single day by a single (1st-level) miner!!!

YOU call it "ridiculous." I call it "below-average effiency." But then, I'm in management.

--ligiS ehT (My evil goateed twin)

 

[Moulin Rogue]

Mongoose's Quintessential Dwarf devotes 13 pages to rules for mining and smelting. The notes at the end do admit that the progress is set unrealistically fast to preserve the high fantasy vibe.

 

[Pyrex]

heh... this illustrates my biggest problem with WotC's Craft rules.

The method you mentioned also works (identically, I might add) for a copper mine, a silver mine, a gold mine, a platinum mine, a gem mine, an aluminum mine, a tin mine, etc. - by which I mean that the value of material pulled from a given mine each week does not depend at ALL on the intrinsic value of the material itself.

There's a pretty simple fix here too.

To reflect mining conditions and/or value of material, you can apply circumstance bonuses/penalties to either the Profession or the Craft check.

Ex:
->Mine is in a swamp (-4 to Profession(Mining))
->Adamantine is rare & valuable (+6 to Profession(Mining))
->Veins of adamantine are exceptionally pure (+4 to Craft(Metalworking))

Ex2:
->Well-built but abandoned dwarven mine (+4 to Prof(Mining))
->Copper is generally worthless (-4 to Prof(Mining))
->Copper-ore is low-quality (-2 to Craft(Metalworking))

 

[evileeyore]

Something else to keep in mind is that most mines have more than one ore/gemstone/etc being mined. Okay IR I only know about Diamond and Silver mines having other precious commodities, Diamond being lesser grade gemstones, or ore, and Silver having either tin or bauxite (can't remember).

So what I am saying is, quite likely there is some other 'cheaper' metal or semi precious in the vien. Probably more of the cheap stuff than adamantine. So even when they aren't pulling high grade adamantite they are probably pulling out something.

TTFN

EvilE

 

[mysticsorcerer]

now, i haven't been playing very long but when i DM, i love to mess with my " pawns' " heads. first off, obviously, it would take a long time to get any of the adamentine out. so maybe in the process, they inadvertently wake something (cough . . dragon . . cough . .cough) or maybe the local dwarven miners get word of this and a little war breaks out.