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Dwarven Core Harvesting

This mod adds a new building, the 'Magma Dredger', that dwarves can use to dredge up rocks and ores from the floor of the magma sea, then process the rocks further in a powered millstone for extra goodies. Dorfs love to wind down after a long day at the mountainhomes with an afternoon of magma-fishing.

Dredging uses the Pump Operator skill, giving legendary pump operators a bit of meaning in their lives. A better skill means faster dredging.

The production rate is quite slow- you'll need to set up a whole district of dredgers to really get an impressive flow of metals. Mining normally will always be the better option if ore veins are available. But now you can embark on sites with no flux stones/iron and have the ability to get some for your fortress.


If you can set up logistics to transport rocks from the dredgers to a powered millstone, you can process them further into extra ores, kaolinite for porcelain, and certain cheap gemstones.
If you go even further and set up an obsidian caster, you can try striking it rich by processing Kaolinite and Obsidian together. If you're exceptionally lucky (and I mean it...) and with a big enough industry, you might find some shiny minerals from the deepest depths. Don't be too greedy, now...

The dredger works like a magma forge and has to be placed over Lava.


I'd say it's fairly balanced as these types of mods go? You need a big dredging industry to get a good amount of materials and most of what you get is poor quality metals like nickel. The full production line needs plenty of dwarf labor, and transport of boulders from a lava powered building to a mechanically powered building, so you'd need to either have a minecart route, a water reactor, or a lucky embark to make it feasible.