What WOULD you find in a dwarven mine?

[LemmingLord]

Dwarven Porn, Steampunk Marital Aids, Lubrication (for the.. machines and stuff).

[ericthered]

Wells or more advanced forms of plumbing. The dwarves have to get their water from somewhere, unless they only drink ale shipped in, relieve themselves in the corners of the cave, never bathe, and so forth.

[Grouchy Chris]

Unless they are using Destroy Stone to do their excavation, you should find great heaping piles of rock outside. Why doesn't anyone ever include that as a feature of their dungeon?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Grouchy Chris

Unless they are using Destroy Stone to do their excavation, you should find great heaping piles of rock outside. Why doesn't anyone ever include that as a feature of their dungeon?

If it's actually a mine, you'll find vast quantities of mine tailings.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by Luke Bunyip

• Smelters
• Coal storage
• Ore storage

• Forges
• Foundries
• Goldsmiths' workshops
• Tinkers' workshops

There's a lot still to do after you have smelted the ore to metal.

• Refineries

You often have to extract the desirable stuff from the dross before you smelt.

I'd like to point out that coal is not suitable for metallurgical use until it is made into coke in a coking oven. Coke is a post-mediaeval invention, so I usually depict dwarves using charcoal.

In smelting and forging you often find that the amount of fuel (coke or charcoal) needed is vastly greater than that of the ore or metal. Therefore it is common to find that smelters and metal-working industries are located near sources of fuel (forests in mediæval times, coalfields since) or where transport from fuel sources is cheap (i.e. water-borne), rather than near mines. Transporting ore is cheaper than transporting fuel.

On another note, your dwarvish underground works are going to need

• Enormous chimneys to vent the smelters, furnaces, and cooking-fires, using waste heat to drive the ventilation system
• Air intakes and ventilation shafts
• Backup compressors or extractors to keep the breathing-air moving when the furnaces aren't alight.
• Aqueducts
• Sewers
• Latrines
• Baths
• Laundries

Near your kitchens and cold stores (pantries) you need

• Granaries
• Grist-mills
• Bakeries
• Breweries
• Cellars
• Refectories
• Sculleries
• Chandleries (for lamp-oil and candles)

And somewhere or other you need

• Theatres and concert-halls
• Bursaries, with strongrooms for cash and accounts
• Dry-goods storage
• Tailors' workshops
• Cobblers' workshops
• Timber storage
• Carpenters' and cabinetmaker's workshops
• Infirmaries
• Dispensaries

[Luke Bunyip]

Originally Posted by adm

<Smart Alec Hat on>
Dwarves?
<Smart Alec Hat off>

<GM hat on>

Well, maybe you need to go check and see. There could be, or maybe there isn't...

</GM hat>

[Luke Bunyip]

Originally Posted by Brett

• Forges
• Foundries
• Goldsmiths' workshops
• Tinkers' workshops
• Charcoal
• Refineries
• Enormous chimneys to vent the smelters, furnaces, and cooking-fires
• Air intakes and ventilation shafts
• Aqueducts
• Sewers

Check. And great list. Ta muchly mate.

[Luke Bunyip]

Originally Posted by Anthony

If it's actually a mine, you'll find vast quantities of mine tailings.

Originally Posted by Grouchy Chris

Unless they are using Destroy Stone to do their excavation, you should find great heaping piles of rock outside.

That would be in any empty caverns down below, capping the old cess pits or rubbish piles, or lifted up to the surface. IRL where I live is disfigured by countless historical tailings piles, dating back to the gold extraction of the 1860's. Some of them become elevated rabbit warrens...

[adm]

Originally Posted by Brett

I'd like to point out that coal is not suitable for metallurgical use until it is made into coke in a coking oven. Coke is a post-mediaeval invention, so I usually depict dwarves using charcoal.

Actually I assume that the underground Dwarves, having a lot of coal and little wood, figured out the coking process much earlier. This is one of the reasons their steel is superior.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by adm

Actually I assume that the underground Dwarves, having a lot of coal and little wood, figured out the coking process much earlier. This is one of the reasons their steel is superior.

If you're going that way, add "coking ovens" to the list, and take extra precautions about ventilation.