Lurchers as Prospectors

[DarkJester]

Ok. Era 2 of Mistborn has a Wild West type setting. So I was wandering. Where are the lurchers working as prospectors. I don't really know how deep the blue lines would show into the ground, but I would imagine that it would work in water. They wouldn't even have to go in the water and pan. They could just grab a shield and start pulling the gold out of the stream straight to themselves. Let the gold hit the shield and fall at their feet into a pan and suddenly they are rich and barely  had to work for it. 

 

Thoughts?

Edited January 11, 2017 by DarkJester

[Spoolofwhool]

The strength of metal lines is a function of mass and distance from the metal. Since the pieces of gold in stream are fairly small, you would have to be pretty close to them to get much effectiveness. I'm not sure it would work that well, though maybe it would to a certain degree. I can't remember how small those pieces are.

This is in fact assuming gold prospecting in streams is even possible on Scadrial, to which I have my doubts. Consider: the surface of the world, at least in the Basin, is only 300 years old. Gold arrives in streams due to erosion, and I believe that that process takes far longer than 300 years. So, the job of gold prospecting may not even be possible in Scadrial.

[manukos he/him]

It is a cool concept which Sanderson hasn't explored .

I would imagine that it happens,  but it is  just, "off screen" . especialy consideting that metals have their alomantic uses which would make them more valuable . 

[A Budgie she/her]

Just the fact that Lurchers and Coinshots can view the metal 'lines' could make them valuble for mining...it wouldn't surprise me if some mining sites on Scadrial have been found by people able to see the metal lines. They don't even have to pull the metal up; if they are able to detect large viens of metal below the surface they could easily make lots of money by selling the information about the location to a mining company.

[Yezrien]

This would also explain why aluminum is so valuable. It's not just useful, but incredibly rare -- because it's the only metal that can't be easily located (or mined) by allomancers. 

[Eki]

31 minutes ago, Belzedar said:

This would also explain why aluminum is so valuable. It's not just useful, but incredibly rare -- because it's the only metal that can't be easily located (or mined) by allomancers. 

Aluminium was rare for a long time in our world too, because it's hard to extract from bauxite ore. That is, until a certain process was invented, which made it much, much cheaper. I don't think we know if that process has been invented on Scadrial yet.

So aluminium could become much cheaper regardless. Still, good point!

[Kingsdaughter613 she/her]

I don't believe it has, but they probably will soon. Modern Era will probably deal with it.

[Spoolofwhool]

6 hours ago, Eki said:

Aluminium was rare for a long time in our world too, because it's hard to extract from bauxite ore. That is, until a certain process was invented, which made it much, much cheaper. I don't think we know if that process has been invented on Scadrial yet.

So aluminium could become much cheaper regardless. Still, good point!

They have bauxite refining in Era 2. VenDell references it when they're talking about the feruchemical powers at the start of BoM.

[Eki]

8 hours ago, Spoolofwhool said:

They have bauxite refining in Era 2. VenDell references it when they're talking about the feruchemical powers at the start of BoM.

There were older, more expensive bauxite refining processes too, so that doesn't necessarily mean anything. VenDell only describes the process as easy compared to the way aluminium was gathered before the Final Ascension.

[Kaymyth she/her]

On 1/12/2017 at 4:21 AM, Eki said:

There were older, more expensive bauxite refining processes too, so that doesn't necessarily mean anything. VenDell only describes the process as easy compared to the way aluminium was gathered before the Final Ascension.

Right.  The Hall-Heroult process requires electricity to function properly, which is still very, very new in the Basin.  Someone's going to figure it out sooner or later, but the instant it's patented and licensed aluminum prices are going to tank and production is going to skyrocket.

While I'm sure that Lurchers will have their utility in mining and prospecting, not all metallic ores are metals themselves.  A lot of refining processes require some chemical separation of the metal from the rock its bound to, and I have too many questions about how "pure" a metal has to be before it becomes visible to Allomantic senses.

[Kingsdaughter613 she/her]

Well, we know that steel sight can be pushed to see things that we wouldn't envision as metals... A painting, for example.