Ore Finder

Points you to the ore veins around you in Valheim 1.0. Every second the mod looks for ore within a configurable radius (20 m by default). The first time a vein comes into range it gets a screen arrow with its name and distance, a coloured light, a vertical beam and a glow, for 10 seconds by default. Each vein is shown once, so walking past a deposit you already know does not nag you.

Only real ore counts: copper and tin deposits, silver veins, iron scrap piles, flametal. Plain rocks, obsidian and black marble are ignored unless you list them. Press F9 to turn the finder on and off.

Client-side: install it on every player's game that should use it. Nothing is needed on the server, and players without the mod can play on the same server.

Source, issues and releases: github.com/egor-muindor/ValheimMods.

Features

• Screen arrow: an arrow with the ore name and distance is drawn over the vein while it is in view. When the vein is behind you or outside the screen, the arrow sits at the screen edge and points towards it.
• Vein highlight: a pulsing point light in the ore's colour (orange for copper, blue-grey for tin, white for silver, rust for iron, red for flametal), a 30 m vertical beam and an emissive tint on the vein itself. Everything fades out at the end of the highlight.
• Once per vein: a vein is highlighted the first time it enters the radius and not again, until you leave the world or run orefinder reset.
• Ore list: look for every ore, or only the ones you name.
• Map pin: a dot pin named after the ore, saved with your map, for every found vein. Nothing is added when another pin is already nearby, so your own pins and re-found veins do not pile up.
• Toggle key: F9 by default, configurable, with modifiers if you like. The state is saved to the config file.

Installation

Requires BepInEx 5.

• With a mod manager (r2modman, Thunderstore Mod Manager): install as usual.
• By hand: unzip the release and copy the plugins/OreFinder folder into BepInEx/plugins, so the mod ends up at BepInEx/plugins/OreFinder/OreFinder.dll.

The config file BepInEx/config/muindor.OreFinder.cfg is created on first launch.

Configuration

General

Key	Default	Description
Enabled	true	Enable the finder. The toggle key flips this setting in game and saves it.
ToggleKey	F9	Key that turns the finder on and off in game. Modifiers are allowed, e.g. F9 + LeftControl. Ignored while typing in the chat or the console.
IsDebug	false	Log every vein that is found, with its prefab and the item that made it count as ore.

Detection

Key	Default	Description
Radius	20	Search radius in metres around the player, 1 to 200.
ScanInterval	1	Seconds between two scans, 0.1 to 30.
Ores	empty	Which ores to look for, comma-separated. Empty = every ore. Otherwise item names (CopperOre, TinOre, SilverOre, IronScrap, FlametalOre, FlametalOreNew) or object prefab names (rock4_copper, silvervein, MineRock_Obsidian).

Highlight

Key	Default	Description
Duration	10	Seconds a newly found vein stays highlighted, 1 to 120.
ScreenMarker	true	Draw the arrow with the ore name and distance.
Beam	true	Draw the vertical beam above the vein.
Light	true	Light up the vein and the ground around it with a coloured, pulsing light.
Glow	true	Tint the vein's own material with an emissive glow. Only works for materials whose shader has an emission colour.
Message	true	Show a top-left message with the ore name and distance when a vein is found.

Map

Key	Default	Description
MapPin	true	Add a dot pin named after the ore to the map when a vein is found. The pin is saved with your map like one you placed yourself.
MapPinSpacing	10	Do not add a pin when any other pin (yours, the mod's, a death marker, ...) is within this many metres, 0 to 100. 0 = always add. Moving or momentary pins (players, shouts, pings, events) do not count.

What counts as ore

With an empty Ores list, a mineable object is ore when one of the items it drops has the word Ore or Scrap in its name: CopperOre, TinOre, SilverOre, IronScrap, FlametalOre, FlametalOreNew. Anything a game update adds with such a name is picked up automatically. LeatherScraps and ShieldCore do not qualify, and neither do Stone, Obsidian, BlackMarble or Softtissue.

With a list, an object is ore when one of its drops or its own prefab name is in the list. Names are case-insensitive and $item_ localisation keys are accepted. The list replaces the rule: to get every ore plus obsidian, list all of them:

Ores = CopperOre, TinOre, SilverOre, IronScrap, FlametalOre, FlametalOreNew, Obsidian

Console command

orefinder status   # show the active settings and counters
orefinder on       # turn the finder on (same as the toggle key)
orefinder off      # turn it off
orefinder reset    # forget the veins already shown, so they are highlighted again
orefinder reload   # re-read the config file

How it works

Once per ScanInterval the mod walks the objects the game has loaded around the player (ZNetScene's instance table) and keeps the ones within Radius. Each object's prefab is classified once, through its drop table: MineRock5 (copper, silver, flametal), MineRock (tin, obsidian) and DropOnDestroyed (scrap piles). An untouched copper or silver deposit is a plain Destructible that turns into the mineable MineRock5 on the first hit, so the finder also looks at what a destructible spawns when destroyed. Veins are remembered by their network id and position: a partly mined deposit is still the same vein, and so is the rock that replaces an intact deposit after the first hit.

The highlight does not touch the vein's game object: the light and beam are separate objects, and the glow is a material property block that is cleared when the highlight ends. Map pins go through Minimap.AddPin like your own pins and are saved with the map. The screen markers are drawn with IMGUI, so no canvas or font asset is needed. The only Harmony patch is Terminal.InitTerminal, for the console command.

Compatibility

• Works alongside any mod: nothing of the game is patched except the console command registration.
• Modded ores are found when their ore item's prefab name contains the word Ore or Scrap; otherwise add them to Ores.
• The toggle key is checked through the game's input layer (ZInput), so it works with the same keys the game accepts.

License

MIT