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[AlwayzL3git]

I can never find Lignite or Bituminous Coal in any of my sites.
..?
Are they specified to certain regions like mountains or something?

Thanks in Advance--
AlwayzL3git

[Victor6]

Iirc, there's no guaranteed location for Bituminous coal or Lignite. You're better off either using wood for charcoal, or use DFhacks 'prospect all' command before you pick your embark location.

[AlwayzL3git]

Iirc, there's no guaranteed location for Bituminous coal or Lignite. You're better off either using wood for charcoal, or use DFhacks 'prospect all' command before you pick your embark location.

I did so, but I can never find any. I found some once, but that was a long time ago.

[greycat]

If I understand correctly, lignite and bituminous coal are most likely to appear in sedimentary layers, near the surface.  They're pretty uncommon in my experience, but that may simply be due to the types of biomes where I tend to embark.

Of course, increasing the mineral frequency setting (or decreasing the mineral scarcity setting, if you use advanced world gen) should help.

[Hurkyl]

I have a suspicion that coal is more common in the sorts of places that aquifers are common.

[KroganElite]

I also usually see more coal in areas with aquifers. In my experience it is quite rare to find coal in regions with no aquifer unless you change world-gen parameters.

[Catsup]

consider embarking with 100 or more bit coal rocks at the start, for me those only cost 3 points each, and can be made into 9 coke with a magma forge each. Which makes 900 coke for steel, and more than you'll ever need.

You can then make and melt steel leggings for a 150% return while training up a legendary armorsmith or 2.

[Quietust]

I have a suspicion that coal is more common in the sorts of places that aquifers are common.

I also usually see more coal in areas with aquifers. In my experience it is quite rare to find coal in regions with no aquifer unless you change world-gen parameters.

Your suspicions are nothing more than superstition - there is absolutely no link between coal and aquifers in DF.

[WealthyRadish]

I find that the best solution (especially since the mining/smelting change) is to buy coal on embark and use that supply until you hit magma. It's only 3 embark points per stone, and if mineral scarcity is set somewhat low then there's a very good chance that any given civilization will have access to coal or lignite.

Edit: Oh god, didn't read two posts up. What Catsup said.

[Skorpion]

I have a suspicion that coal is more common in the sorts of places that aquifers are common.

I also usually see more coal in areas with aquifers. In my experience it is quite rare to find coal in regions with no aquifer unless you change world-gen parameters.

Your suspicions are nothing more than superstition - there is absolutely no link between coal and aquifers in DF.

Aside from correlation; aquifers are typically found in sedminentary-heavy embarks, which is the same with coal.

You're very unlikely to find any coal at all. Your best bet is deforestation for charcoal, and ordering wood, refined coal, and coal rocks off the dwarven caravans.
Even then, you'll burn through it like crazy after a while. My current fort had a few veins of lignite and bituminous coal, but I ended up burning through the lot in steel production after a few years, and I'm back to clearcutting the forest.

Consider yourself lucky this is DF2012. In 40d, it was hard to find magma at all. I once had a fort with a military in all steel, refined the hard way with charcoal all the way from ore to finished item.

[AlwayzL3git]

I have NEVER made a magma forge. I usually have a nice set-up using a metalsmith's area when I was new, and it worked well. I have never tried to... reforge it!
HA!
Excuse my silly puns. 

[jimboo]

If you embark with running water, it will be sedimentary and it will have lignite/coal.  Add clay, increase the quantity and percentage (dunno why, just does, gets you sand, too, should you want it; you can leave soil on Search as N/A; look for clay, you'll get soil and sand).  Set "minerals to everywhere" and you'll have more than enough coal and lignite in a sed biome to not care if you find magma or not (which is clearly not in the spirit of the embark).

[DWC]

My suggestion, if your parent civ does have access to coal on embark, it means some subregion they occupy has coal in it's sedimentary layers.

Before I did the cheaty-face DFhack thing, I'd copy the region I wanted to play, had a custom embark profile (Royal engineer Corps) with 7 miners and I'd poke around in the ground in interesting embark areas to see what was there before going to my unadulterated profile and embarking for real. All the ore and stuff will be in the exact same places.

I also turn the volcanism parameter to max=o because it tends to dramatically reduce the number of good embarks by replacing sedimentary layers with vile gabbro and whatever else.

[TripJack]

Coal just isn't that common. If you want better chances of coal, I think you can modify worldgen settings to make more sedimentary layers.

If you embark with running water, it will be sedimentary and it will have lignite/coal.

What makes you say this? Pretty sure it isn't accurate.

[Garath]

it isn't, but technically speaking, you possibly have more chances on finding sedimentaries near rivers. Even though that might be true, that is still no guarantee at all to have lignite or coal