Leave out specific chunks when using /wgen regen

[Friedrich I.]

I recently started this very fun game for the very first time. I currently played on my main map for like 15h realtime realizing, that tin, zinc, lime or other highly needed stuff are nowhere to be found even If i spend hours on prospecting. I don't want to start all over again so I thought I could change some ore spawn rates. Those would obviously onl apply to new chunks so that won't help me plus my lime problem would'nt be solved either. So now I stumbled across /wgen regen which apperantly allows me to reload my ingame chunks. Sadly this would also delete most of the progress I made including buildings so now I wonder if there is a way to exclude certain chunks from this command.

Thanks in advance.

[Streetwind]

Welcome to the forums!

No, there is no such function in that command. You can only try regenerating from multiple locations around your base with the radius set so that it doesn't hit it.

But, this is the wrong approach anyway. It won't do you any good, for a number of reasons.

For starters, any given stone type can only host certain ores. If you are living in an area that has no sedimentary stone layer, for instance, you can regenerate that a thousand times and you will still never see any form of coal. That is because coal cannot exist in igneous stones. Much like coal, each ore has its own rules for where it can appear. You can find out what stone types can host any given ore by searching for the nugget (or whatever the individual piece is, like a piece of coal) in the ingame handbook.

To change which stone type you have, you need to change the world seed. And when you do that, the terrain changes as well. So each chunk you regenerate will be completely different terrain from what it was before. It might be a slice of a mountain, it might be a spot of lake. Either way, there will be drastic seams between your base and the regenerated terrain.

Oh, yeah: limestone is a stone type, not an ore. So you will never find it by regenerating terrain without changing the world seed.

Then, there's the fact that if you want to do things this way, it's not going to be the only time you do this. Because you think that you just need some tin to progress now. Let's say you make some generate nearby through some commands. Great! Now you need iron. And then you need borax. And then you need a meteor. And then you need bauxite. And then you need olivine. And then you need ilmenite. Some sulfur would also be nice. How about galena for those fancy leaded window panes... Do you really want to regenerate your landscape for each new resource you find yourself suddenly in need of? And what if you need multiple ones, and the regeneration removed one type of ore in favor of spawning another?

Additionally, it trains you into the entirely wrong way of thinking. You're not supposed to stay in your base. Vintage Story is an exploration game, and the various resources you need are intentionally prevented from appearing all in the same location. If you did not walk at least 5k blocks in all possible directions from your home base looking for what you need, there's a very high chance you're not going to find all of it. Sometimes you'll have to go even further. Go out there, cover some ground! You might be surprised by what you find. Did you know that there are different climate zones with entirely different vegetation and animals? Ruins with hidden treasure that tell the backstory of the world? New beautiful, scenic places you can build outposts and secondary bases in? You're not going to see them if you sit at home, you know

 

Finally, I'm fairly sure that there's more ore nearby than you think it is, you're just not good enough at prospecting yet. It's got a steep learning curve. Tin ore generates in igneous layers, and there is always a minimum of one igneous layer in any given location. Some locations may have better conditions than just that, but in principle tin ore can generate literally anywhere. You just have to learn how to search for it.

And if you are frustrated and really can't be bothered right now - there's far more comfortable ways of cheating than terrain regeneration. Try /gamemode creative, for instance.

[Friedrich I.]

Thank you for your detailed response! You are right I don't want my experience to be blurred by those kinds of cheats aswell so I took my time heading into a direction I've never been before. Suddenly I found a whole biome of limestone plus a cave with tin nearby. Feels better to find something yourself indeed. I would consider moving my base aswell but sadly there's no convenient way to move your livestock yet. Anyway thanks for you time :-).

 

[Streetwind]

2 hours ago, Friedrich I. said:

sadly there's no convenient way to move your livestock yet

Keep your fingers crossed for 1.15, there may just be something coming in that regard...