Futile Bauxite, a fresh start... and losing interest.

[Andael]

I've read some comments about how some have loved the struggle to find bauxite... but that's after they eventually found it.

In a recent playthrough I was ready for steel at about 80h in. My primary focus became "find bauxite".

I spent winters delving caves for translocators. Found and repaired five in total.
I spent summers exploring the lands they sent me to.
I toggled the map settings to the old "truecolor" to help reveal exposed bauxite (with the intent to turn it back after finding, which never happened).
I traveled from each of the translocator endpoints back to "home", and then even between the endpoints, desperate to fill out the map.
I bored holes through the sedimentary layers periodically to check for a bauxite layer beneath all the dirt, lime, clay, and sand...
I used someone's tip about lapis lazuli occuring in only a few rock types including bauxite... but it was always limestone.
I found olivine and titanium.
And trunks of iron ore, waiting.

As the search continues, the overhead to even get to the frontiers increases. I considered heading out minimally and just dying to respawn at home... but that feels bad to intentionally use the mechanic in this way. That's not surviving, and not fun for me... though I wasn't having fun anymore anyway.

So I began a fresh game, after over 200h. I estimate that more than 50h of my life was spend just racing across terrain scanning for bauxite and boring sample-holes. Stress on the boring. It didn't even spark much emergent gameplay, unlike the hunt for metals.

I'm not enjoying this new playthrough as much though... I like what I'd accomplished in the prior game. Vintage Story really stresses the effort needed to accomplish things, and this amplifies the value of achievements... but also has been killing my interest to re-do it, especially when aspects of the current world make results feel worse.

It would be nice if there was something to be done to make this effort seem progressive... rather than searching a map which ultimately feels devoid of bauxite because of the way random numbers turned out. Alternative materials, a longer process, sifting bauxite bits from conglomerate gravel... something.

Sad tuba noises.

[Maelstrom]

VS be like

Yes, finding certain things (like bauxite, borax, bees and other non-B related resources) can be exceedingly frustrating.

BTW - Welcome to VS and the forums. 

[Thorfinn]

Borax is by far the worst, IMO. You need so terribly little, but it stops you cold. Would be nice if it were more common as evaporite in dry lakes. At least then you know you have to explore the deserts, where there is lots of visibility. Maybe in the future one could boil the water from alkali streams and ponds...

@Andael, sorry about your woes. Unless you start in granite, there seems to always be bauxite within about 5000 in some direction. Granite, you might be ranging out to 10k. A corollary is if you find granite, you might as well go some other direction because it is going to take hella long to cross it. My best luck has been waiting for a clear day and building a ladder to the top of the world. If you have the graphics card for it, you can crank the view distance all the way up, and it's rare I have to do that more than 3-4 times.

Edited October 4, 2024 by Thorfinn

[StCatharines]

Pick a (non-granite, preferably) direction, and start running. 10k blocks, maybe 20k in a worst-case, and you'll find some.

[Andael]

Thanks for the tip about granite, I hadn't seen that before.

The world I got had me starting in sandstone with underlying granite and andesite. Traveling out from here most directions gets me hills and plains of thick claystone, limestone, or shale. I'll burrow 40 blocks before I hit granite or andesite (checking in case bauxite has been hiding beneath all this sedimentary layering). Really, it seems like my situation should be ideal -- the sedimentary layers are so thick and layered; I need to dig deep to even find the underlying hard rock. Just hasn't been any bauxite in the mix. Plenty of every other sedimentary rock.

When I went through translocators I basically find more of the same. Two of them exited deep under limestone hills. I can only imagine that those having trouble finding limestone must be living on top of bauxite or something, being my karmic complement. I've had no end of limestone.

I imagine borax can be a problem, since you pretty much have to stumble into it. With that I've been lucky in three worlds -- finding borax rather early in caves, and then more later. I've rarely found ores in caves, as many recommend. Instead I find brown coal, sulfur, saltpeter, and borax. Ores I've been getting almost entirely by prospecting and vertical shafts.

 

 

[Andael]

11 minutes ago, StCatharines said:

... maybe 20k in a worst-case, and you'll find some.

Someone has to be worst-case. It's one of the things about statistics... a specific sample case isn't guaranteed to fall into normal, and *someone* will be an outlier.

Perhaps I have more running to do. Some of this terrain is so arduous. Like swiss-cheese mountains having vertical pits extending deep below sealevel. I imagine the terrain generation parameters at some extremes.

 

 

[LadyWYT]

Unfortunately I don't think bauxite is an item sold by any of the traders, or that would be an option. You might get lucky and find some in a ruin, although I'm not sure if the rocks in ruin vessels are determined by the surrounding rock types or type. And even if they aren't, that's still somewhat of a longshot.

If you want to hang on to that world though and need a break from running, I would go hunting for translocators and repair them. They'll save you a few thousands blocks of travel time, plus you might get lucky and pop out next to some bauxite or other point of interest.

 

[Andael]

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

Unfortunately I don't think bauxite is an item sold by any of the traders

Ha, okay thanks for that. I've been checking a commodity trader on occasion, just in case.

I've repaired five translocators, and made use of them to extend my reach. I keep checking caves for more. But it's getting to the point where I have to range far even to explore new caves.

Is there a rough "density" of translocators to be expected? Two of mine are about a 15min run away. I imagine there must be many more closer.

Also, are they guaranteed to be connected to caves? I found a ruin structure completely sealed underground, at something like y=-60. Only found it because of a drifter sloshing around in water surrounding the ruin in it's sealed chamber.

It might be neat to have a Jonas-type device you could make which resonated with other such machinery, like a dowsing rod. That would certainly be something I'd invest some effort into in this world to help my otherwise blind and desperate search.

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

you might get lucky and pop out next to some bauxite

Every time I find a translocator, that's been the hope! Only to feel that hope drain away into misery over the course of the following game-week as I explore around and eventually make the trek home the long-way, overland. All of my destinations have been very similar/familar, except one with redwoods which was nice. Still with rocks like "home" though.

 

[Thorfinn]

A belated, "Welcome to the forums, @Andael!

5 hours ago, Andael said:

Some of this terrain is so arduous. Like swiss-cheese mountains having vertical pits extending deep below sealevel. I imagine the terrain generation parameters at some extremes.

This is the best part of building ladders to the top of the world. There are almost always decent passes through that are not apparent from the ground, or even if you play with the map.

[LadyWYT]

2 hours ago, Andael said:

Is there a rough "density" of translocators to be expected?

Not that I am aware of. I've found two that were within about 25 blocks of each other, so either that was a freak occurrence, or it's rather random as to whether or not one will spawn in the chunk.

2 hours ago, Andael said:

Also, are they guaranteed to be connected to caves?

I want to say that they're *supposed* to be. Whether or not they generate with an accessible entrance though(without digging required)--that I don't know.

2 hours ago, Andael said:

It might be neat to have a Jonas-type device you could make which resonated with other such machinery, like a dowsing rod.

True. I've got the suspicion that an unstable chunk might be a strong indication that there's a translocator nearby, which would make sense given that Jonas tech seems to potentially be behind what caused the temporal catastrophe in the first place. You might also try checking near traders, as whenever I use a translocator it always seems to spit me out somewhere near a trader. No guarantees that you'll find anything with these methods, but there do seem to be trends.

[Thorfinn]

10 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Not that I am aware of. I've found two that were within about 25 blocks of each other

That's not even all that uncommon.

10 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Whether or not they generate with an accessible entrance though(without digging required)--that I don't know.

They can spawn in caves that have no entrance. I've tunneled a short distance chasing drifters, into a dead-end set of caverns, with translocators.

10 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

I've got the suspicion that an unstable chunk might be a strong indication that there's a translocator nearby

I've wondered about that. There's usually a largish cave system beneath one, but maybe that's true in general. Might be superstition, but I rarely encounter caves if I drill boreholes where the gear is turning the right direction on the surface.

[Michael Gates]

On 10/4/2024 at 11:05 AM, Andael said:

In a recent playthrough I was ready for steel at about 80h in. My primary focus became "find bauxite".

There are two kinds of worlds: About one time in four, you see bauxite in your first two days of running; the rest of worlds you will spend years hunting and not finding it. You don't have to do steel, but if you plan to, just roll a new world if you haven't seen baux during those first two days. There is no virtue in spending in-game years looking for the stuff.

[Omega Haxors]

Real life information helps. You're probably not going to find a hot biome in the middle of winter wonderland. If you went North, East, or West in your search, your chances are slim.

Bauxite is also a surface strata, so there's very little point looking for it underground. The guide doesn't outright tell you this: you have to infer it with the information that it does.

Most video games teaches you to gamble mindlessly, Vintage Story is one of the few games where your knowledge of the world matters far more to your success. For every method that requires a huge blind leap of faith there are multiple methods where your observational skills will guide you to where you need to be. I used to think that finding halite was unreasonably difficult until I looked into where you can find it and now I have more than I really know what to do with.

One thing I will agree with though is that there are too many times where you need to learn how to find a material where as soon as you do you have nearly limitless amounts of it, but the gameplay only requires you use a few pieces of it. I remember just overpaying for the Borat I needed for the iron anvil because it really feels like the game is disrespecting your time by expecting the player to go on a grand adventure for something they're only going to use 3 times max throughout their entire session. I'm sure this problem will get better as more core progression is added to the game, but as it stands now it feels really bad gameplay-wise to jump from iron to steel and many feel it's not worthwhile to go for despite being +1 tier and 4x the durability of iron at no real cost.

Edited October 5, 2024 by Omega Haxors

[Zane Mordien]

I pack several days of supplies and pick a direction and run for days until I find it. That has always worked for me. 

[Bl0ckparty]

I'm sorry you're having a tough time.  Streamers I've been watching since before VS v1.5.5 still struggle to find some resources.  Hearing the disappointment in their voice when they find out the distant white color on the map was actually light gray granite instead of the hoped for limestone or chalk.  Struggling so hard to find copper that they rage-quit and start up a new world and land in a desert where copper is so easily visible that it seems to be everywhere--but once they're several videos into the world they start struggling to find cassiterite/tin, or they find bismuth, but no sphalerite/zinc.  One person was looking for three episodes to find clay!  So you are definitely not alone when it comes to trying to find a certain required game resource!  Bemoaning the time required to try to find something in VS is like a rite of passage.  How many hours did it take you to find xxx?  What about xxx?  You mean to tell me you didn't have any useful Traders within a day of your spawn?  Have you found a Treasure Hunter Trader at all, or did you just go out 5,000 blocks from spawn and start looking for glaciers to find the Archive on your own?

If you are truly, truly upset.  Give yourself a few days break and come back with some fresh eyes.  Maybe take a few translocator trips and walk back to spawn.  Maybe you "jumped" over a small bauxite deposit.

If you are still discouraged, and want to start over, I offer you this:  I'm still in 1.19.8, and I'm using my favorite world seed 1814993918.  It's my favorite for a reason.  Give it a try and tell me how it works out for you.

[Andael]

On 10/5/2024 at 3:19 PM, Omega Haxors said:

Bauxite is also a surface strata, so there's very little point looking for it underground.

It can't be found under other sedimentary layers? It seems my world has endless strata of claystone/limestone/sandstone/shale overlapping each other, sometimes with soil on top. Thick enough that steep cliffsides are often just the sedimentary rock without any visible metamorphic layer. After struggling to find any visible bauxite I started boring holes until I find the underlying metamorphic. Or am I wrong here and bauxite will only be on top aside from soil or igneous?

 

[Andael]

I've felt somewhat encouraged to resume the search -- to just load up on pies and travel overland forever... but waiting until winter passes again so I don't have snow obscuring things.

To bide my time, I'm again searching for translocators. Only found one more so far, but nothing immediately interesting on the other end -- I'll probably use it as the launch-point for my later walkabout.

On the speculations of where to find translocators... I've wondered if rusty gears in caves could be a hint? I could easily be seeing coincidence, since a rusty gear leads me to search more thoroughly.

So far, four translocators in my world are within about 300 blocks of home (which is right at 0, 0). So they do seem fairly common. I've been trying to find and fully explore every cave during this winter... except the deep occupied caverns I'm not comfortable tackling. It's what I'd like steel plate for. My iron chain gets shredded too easily.

About those particularly bad caverns with nests, bells, and everything spawning... I've only cleared two, but there wasn't really anything worthwhile to gain aside from access to more cavern -- ultimately deadends and the usual loot drops of nests and bells. They don't seem very worthwhile to tackle compared to the resources to repair armor and make new weapons. So I'm wondering if I'm missing something of value there or have just been unlucky?

 

[StCatharines]

2 hours ago, Andael said:

About those particularly bad caverns with nests, bells, and everything spawning... I've only cleared two, but there wasn't really anything worthwhile to gain aside from access to more cavern -- ultimately deadends and the usual loot drops of nests and bells. They don't seem very worthwhile to tackle compared to the resources to repair armor and make new weapons. So I'm wondering if I'm missing something of value there or have just been unlucky?

I have found no more or less valuable ruins/loot in deeper caves than in very shallow caves. It seems entirely random.

If you're after specific ores or larger nodes, they do seem to be deeper.

[Andael]

1 hour ago, StCatharines said:

I have found no more or less valuable ruins/loot in deeper caves than in very shallow caves. It seems entirely random.

Thank-you. Then I will avoid such caverns unless I know there's something I want. Or, if I want to explore nearby but with some peace rather than having my thoughts impeded by a blaring Bell.

 

[StCatharines]

Unless you're after tuning cylinders or Jonas parts, there's very little point in standing and fighting a bell. Easier to simply explore elsewhere and come back after it despawns.

[LadyWYT]

8 hours ago, Andael said:

Or am I wrong here and bauxite will only be on top aside from soil or igneous?

I'm pretty sure bauxite can be under other sedimentary layers, as I could swear that I've dug into bauxite layers before. It just tends to be much easier to spot when it's the top layer.

8 hours ago, Andael said:

On the speculations of where to find translocators... I've wondered if rusty gears in caves could be a hint? I could easily be seeing coincidence, since a rusty gear leads me to search more thoroughly.

I don't think it's coincidence, although I think the rusty gears tend to more point to a ruin being nearby, and not necessarily a translocator. Of course, it could just as easily be happenstance, in that some poor soul died there a long time ago.

 

[Lollard]

I wish you could ask merchants or future NPCs about stuff like this

Something like

Quote

PLAYER: You seem like well traveled fellow, seen any orange rocks?

TRADER: Hmmm... well yes, now that you mention it, I saw some quite a ways southeast of here.

 

[Brady_The]

3 hours ago, Lollard said:

I wish you could ask merchants or future NPCs about stuff like this

Something like

I just recently thought about that too. Maybe a bit more general. Something like

Quote

Player: Have seen anything interesting around here?

Trader: I know of/have seen/came across [POV/BLOCK in list of appropriate answers] to the [CARDINAL DIRECTION].

Trader: Sorry, can't help you. Nothing interesting going on here.

It most certainly would improve the interactivity with the world and make it feel less static.

[Andael]

I finally found bauxite. Almost exactly 10000 blocks away from origin, to the north-northeast.

With the advice here I decided to commit to a long run I'd probably die on... goal being bauxite or death. So I went lean, with only one old hunter's backpack, no heavier armor, old gear, and three sliced up pies (I should've taken more... got lucky with a lot of frozen berries though -- it was March and northerly).

Because I was hedging my bet and traveling light, yet managed to return home safely... I had to make another trip -- properly equipped (with two mining sacks).

On 10/4/2024 at 1:34 PM, Thorfinn said:

if you find granite, you might as well go some other direction

You ain't kiddin'. From the translocator I started from, heading away from "home"... the world soon turned to granite, and granite... and granite. While I crossed fields of granite gravel... shorelines of only granite sand, and nothing exposed but granite beneath the thinnest topsoil... I kept thinking back to your comment. But I didn't have much choice in direction from this translocator, else I'd be headed toward explored territory. I went 11k blocks and still granite, so I began to loop back... and on that large loop I finally found the bauxite.

In my initial searching I was trying to sweep "breadth-first", hoping to find the closest bauxite to home. I also didn't want to risk losing gear days away from spawn. But sometimes you need to clear large spans of a particular geology... so maybe better to just pick a direction and keep going, fast.

[Maelstrom]

And that feeling when you finally saw that blessed neon orange was so incredibly delightful!

Gratz on sticking it out.