Ores

Ores are primary crafting materials. They must generally be crafted into Bars at a Furnace before being used in crafting recipes, though some recipes (eg. Potions and Bricks) require raw Ores. Bars can be crafted into tools, weapons, armor, and other items. Raw Ores can be also be used as building materials.

Ores are primarily obtained by mining them from veins underground with a Pickaxe. They may also be found as random rewards in Wooden Crates caught via Fishing, or by placing Silt or Slush blocks into an Extractinator. Other ores may also have other ways of being collected.

A world will contain only one Ore type from each tier naturally. Tiers with more than one possible type will have a single one chosen at random for each generated world. Refer to the tables below for the possible Ore types that can generate for each tier. Hardmode Ore types are chosen at random when Demon/Crimson Altars are destroyed. The Ore types a world does not spawn naturally can be obtained from an Extractinator or Wooden Crates, or by importing them from other worlds.

Hardmode
Spawning the first three tiers of Hardmode Ore requires the destruction of Demon/Crimson Altars. This requires a Hammer with 80% hammer power or higher, eg. the Pwnhammer. Each destroyed Altar spawns deposits of one of six new Hardmode Ores, replacing natural world blocks below the underground layer:


 * 1) First Altar: Cobalt Ore or Palladium Ore
 * 2) Second Altar: Mythril Ore or Orichalcum Ore
 * 3) Third Altar: Adamantite Ore or Titanium Ore


 * Destroying a fourth Altar spawns another round of whichever type spawned for the first Altar (Cobalt or Palladium). A fifth spawns more of whichever type spawned for the second Altar (Mythril or Orichalcum), etc.
 * Destroying more Altars will never spawn Hardmode ore types beyond the 3 that were randomly assigned to your world during the initial round of destroyed Altars. A world with Palladium Ore deposits will never spawn Cobalt Ore deposits, or vice versa.
 * Chlorophyte Ore spawns on its own once Hardmode is triggered, and is not affected by destroyed Altars.

Tips

 * Each hardmode ore is chosen at the moment you break the first three altars in the world. You can choose the ores you like by quitting your world without saving (by ending the task or killing the process) after smashing your first altars. It is easier done with a server.
 * Almost all ores are highlighted via the Spelunker buff, allowing you to gather them in large amounts (this requires a tier 4 ore, but they can be found again with this). Hellstone is not lit up by this, although it is by a Dangersense Potion.
 * Using a Crate Potion will improve the chances of obtaining crates, and as such the ore-bearing wooden crates.
 * If you fill in caves with spare natural blocks such as dirt, Hardmode ores can spawn in them. They can then also be seen on the minimal, presenting an easy way to convert extra blocks into ores and know their exact location.

Trivia

 * Many ores' item sprites are modified versions of other ore sprites:
 * Demonite Ore sprite is a recolor of Iron Ore.
 * Meteorite is a recolor of Gold Ore.
 * Obsidian is a recolor of Copper Ore.
 * Hellstone is a recolor of Silver Ore.
 * Adamantite Ore is a reversed, 90-degrees-rotated and recolored version of Cobalt Ore.
 * Most of them in placed form also appear to be a modified stone texture, these being the ones released before 1.2, plus platinum and possibly paladium. Tin and lead also seem to share a base texture.
 * Hellstone is the only ore that cannot be created infinitely within one world. The 8 pre-Hardmode Ores can be obtained from an Extractinator; these plus the Hardmode Ores that spawn from destroying Altars can be obtained from Crates, Chlorophyte can be grown, Meteorite can fall infinitely onto replenishable blocks, and Obsidian can be created using liquid bugs.
 * Iron, lead, meteorite and chorophyte are the only ores not to have bricks.

History

 * Added Chlorophyte Ore.

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