I'm getting conflicting information as to how prospecting works:
When repeatedly scanning the same square, does the game re-roll the prospecting roll every time (i.e. every Rock square has a 8% chance of yielding a deposit multiplied by the skill and equipment modifier?
Or, is it that every square's contents are determined once, including squares which contain nothing. Repeated prospecting means that you can either succeed and find the "nothing" in an empty square, or fail and not find the deposit. You don't know which, but you can work it out if you wanted to ("How likely am I to have failed 5 times in a row?")
It does not reroll anything. Whether or not there is a deposit on the square is already determined, and that does not change. If you prospect and you find nothing, it either means there is nothing or you simply did not find the existing deposit that time. Prospecting again may uncover it, but probability-wise it's less efficient than prospecting a new square, because there is the possibility that there is simply nothing to find.
So it is not the case, for example, that you could prospect a few thousand times to ensure that you find a deposit. Whether or not a deposit exists is determined exactly once.
Along those lines Syn, what about once a deposit is depleted. I know there is a chance that there could be another one there. When is that chance determined, and would bringing in a squad of ground hogs and an ace computer operator be worthwhile?
____________
Warning this is strictly Orions McPhees Opinion, it may or may not have any bearing on events true or imagined