Your first mining trip and tool upgrades
On this page
For your first mining trip, aim to bring home 15 Iron Ore or 15 Lead Ore of the same type. Either haul becomes five matching bars and then an anvil, which opens up metal equipment crafting. Reserve those bars before spending them on a weapon. This route covers unmodded Desktop PC 1.4.5.8, an ordinary seed, and Classic world difficulty.
Pack for the return journey
Start from a usable shelter and carry Torches, blocks, Rope or Platforms, and healing supplies. Put your Pickaxe and weapon somewhere you can switch between them comfortably. If you have a Recall Potion, keep it within easy reach: using one returns you to your spawn point and consumes the potion. It does not create a portal back to the cave. Recall Potions.
Follow a nearby cave and light the route as you go. Before dropping into a shaft, establish a way back up. Before walking off a ledge, look at where you will land. A small opening into darkness is a reason to slow down, especially when you are carrying the ore needed for your first anvil.
Make each trip manageable. Return when healing is running low or the inventory is becoming awkward to use. You can resume from an explored branch next time; you do not need to clear the cave in one visit.
Recognize the ore pairs
Ordinary world generation selects one member of each early pair. Lead in your world is a normal alternative to Iron, not evidence that you have dug in the wrong place. Other ways of acquiring alternate ores exist, so this describes naturally generated veins rather than every item you can obtain. Ore generation.
| Early pair | Ore needed for one matching bar |
|---|---|
| Copper or Tin | 3 |
| Iron or Lead | 3 |
| Silver or Tungsten | 4 |
| Gold or Platinum | 4 |
Your starting Copper Pickaxe can mine the ordinary early ores through Gold and Platinum. You can collect a valuable vein immediately without first crafting every lower pickaxe. Underground Demonite and Crimtane need a stronger pickaxe; the Gold and Platinum options are sufficient for those deposits. Ore mining requirements.
Pick up Life Crystals when you find them. Break one with a Pickaxe, then use the collected item to increase maximum health by 20. Merely keeping it in your inventory gives no permanent health increase. From a new character’s 100 health, fifteen consumed crystals reach 400. A trip that finds a crystal can be worthwhile even if the ore haul is modest. Life Crystals.
Turn the haul into a workshop
| Make | Ingredients | Required station |
|---|---|---|
| Furnace | 20 Stone Blocks + 4 Wood + 3 Torches | Work Bench |
| Iron Anvil | 5 Iron Bars | Work Bench |
| Lead Anvil | 5 Lead Bars | Work Bench |
Place the Furnace and smelt your ore. Three Iron Ore make one Iron Bar; three Lead Ore make one Lead Bar. Five bars of one type make its anvil. A mixed pile of fifteen Iron and Lead Ore is not necessarily enough. Iron and Lead Anvils offer the same crafting recipes, so there is no need to seek out the other version. Furnace, Anvils.
Stand close to the placed station when looking for its recipes. Desktop 1.4.5 also supports crafting from nearby chests, which makes a compact workshop useful. Crafting stations.
Spend the next haul deliberately
A Gold Pickaxe costs 10 Gold Bars and 4 Wood at an Iron or Lead Anvil. The Platinum recipe uses 10 Platinum Bars and 4 Wood at the same station. Each therefore needs 40 matching ore, with the anvil already built. Gold Pickaxe, Platinum recipes.
Choose your next purchase or craft around the last trip’s problem. Repeatedly losing fights points toward a better weapon or armor. Slow, tiring excavation makes a tool upgrade more attractive. Check materials with the Guide’s Craft option before spending them on a guess. Once your workshop and equipment feel reliable, use the Eye of Cthulhu preparation guide to turn exploration progress into a first boss attempt.