Oolite Bulletins

Okay, so I bought a Mining Laser and attached it to the aft of my Cobby MkIII... found some asteroids... blasted one and it split into boulders... I blasted one of these boulders with my Mining Laser and it splintered into well, splinters. If any valuable minerals are found will they be indicated at this stage or do I just need to harvest the splinters and see if they contain anything useful?

In the core game they are just Minerals, although some OXPs can make them more interesting/valuable.

Specifically the ore processor: http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Ore_Processor.

Thanks for the info Falcon777. I don't normally go in for game changing OXPs but that one looks like it will make mining more far more interesting.

No problem. I'm not as disturbed about game changing oxps, but I still felt the same way about the processor: interesting enough to get. I've enjoyed it on occasion. Eventually I'll probably return to my mining transporter save file and work at saving up enough credits to get one.

Reminds me to ask - why is it that if I shoot a boulder with a laser I often end up with nothing, but if I ram it at low speed I nearly always end up with several splinters?

ffutures wrote:

Reminds me to ask - why is it that if I shoot a boulder with a laser I often end up with nothing, but if I ram it at low speed I nearly always end up with several splinters?

Think of the effect the laser is having on the rock, it is vaporised. As the laser is designed to penetrate the armour of ships and their shields. But a rock is a weak unarmoured mineral. But when you slowly ram it it is only kinetic energy that is being transferred to the asteroid and therefore doing minimal damage with very little heat energy.

That's why you specifically have the Mining Laser. It (should) result in a lot of splinters from each Asteroid because it's "tuned" to cut rocks into bits, rather than the combat lasers which are "tuned" to penetrate shields and armour craft.

Micha wrote:

That's why you specifically have the Mining Laser. It (should) result in a lot of splinters from each Asteroid because it's "tuned" to cut rocks into bits, rather than the combat lasers which are "tuned" to penetrate shields and armour craft.

I really need to replace one of my side military lasers with a mining laser - never seem to use the things, might as well have a useful tool instead.

My advice would be to keep practising with the side lasers as when you get the knack of them you can double your damage output and your survivability increases greatly. You no longer get scared of groups of 4 or more ships as you have the confidence to out class them. Instead get a  Rail Gun.

i have a mining laser om the starboard side of my coby but when i aimed at a boulder it blew it to smithereens!!! no splinters to pick up...