I think a simple metal detector would be a welcome addition to the game. I'm not sure how many blocks it should go down in detection. Probably a few blocks farther than what shows in the light would be good. The first tier detector should find metals 2-3 blocks beyond current vision. Maybe based on technology there could be several different detectors which could find more than metal material. End game detectors could have a greater range and be set for specific block types. I would like a metal detector to aid mining. Instead of mining in any random direction I could prospect an area with some detection, then I would mine that area and start my search again. Other Ideas By Kroghammer Mountain Mini-biome varities Layered-Rock/Earth Mech-sized Fighters Ship Safe Zones Climbing Mechanics
I think a neat way to implement it would be like a sonar, you 'ping' and a signal goes out in all directions to find metal or whatever. Imagine this, but as a game overlay where the player is the center and the flashing dot is the ore
It is hard for me to tell how many blocks down the vision goes (I was estimating 6-7)... basically the idea is to have it go 2-3 blocks deeper than what you can see for the 1st tier detector. Other higher tier detectors should work better later in the game.
How accurate would it be? Maybe do a Marco-Polo setup where the detector pings(and drains some energy) and you get a general direction indicator? Not enough to pinpoint, but it gives you a place to start.
I have a better idea! It can be customized which material to detect, and has an extremely huge range, but overall it's just playing Marco-Polo in the end! So it WOULD give you a clue on where to search for that desired material you need so bad, but not simplify the mining process massively!
Metal detector is directed device, isn't it? Anyway, I thought about mechanism block instead of hand device when I saw title of this sugggest. In my mind metal detector is block device that can signal to something (in example door) when something metal is moving around (player with iron armor, glitch or another robots).
Lol yeah I didn't even think of that... I guess they are called the same thing but for different purposes. Security lines have walk through detectors and hand held wand detectors.
I also think think that a simple metal detector would be a welcome addition to the game. It will bring a lot of fun.
I very much like this idea. There should be various tiers of detection with higher tiers giving better: accuracy range specificity quantity By this I mean that the precise location of the ore is better represented, the range the detector scans is better, the type of ore detected is more specific (and possibly is broadened if early detectors don't detect all substances), and in later models the amount of the ore could be indicated somehow. It would be very cool to have late-game items that would do assays across an entire planet (or an entire biome, at least) to check to see if a certain ore is present. Since this is a major time saver, it would render the game rather easy in the late game, so to offset that some, it needs some kind of recharge time or a resource requirement to use it. Just a few thoughts!
