User:MasterShizzle/Hellstone Mining Sandbox

Hellstone Mining Guide: Trial Draft

Overview
Mining Hellstone is a dangerous and sometimes tedious process but worth it, as most of the highest-tier items in the game require large amounts of Hellstone bars. Hellstone is a valuable trade item for multiplayer as well.

What You'll Need
Hellstone mining requires the following:
 * A Nightmare Pickaxe or better
 * A Hellforge, to smelt the ore into bars
 * Obsidian in large amounts, 1 for every 3 hellstone ore
 * An Obsidian Skull isn't strictly necessary but is highly recommended.

Problems Mining
The Obsidian Skull is recommended because Hellstone will damage you on contact without it, much like Meteorite Ore. You'll need stacks upon stacks of Obsidian to forge all the Hellstone bars, so 20 more shouldn't be a problem.

The biggest problem is the Hellstone's location, as the monsters of the underworld are tougher and more aggressive than in any other area in Terraria.

Mining Tips
Mining Hellstone can be a significant problem, not only because Hellstone deals fire damage to the player (which can be nullified by equipping an Obsidian Skull); but mainly because of the dangerous monsters of The Underworld. While Bone Serpents don't appear very often, they can be a problem and should be fought like one would fight any worm monster, preferably using very long range weapons such as the Vilethorn. The greater threat are the Fire Imps, because they constantly respawn and their fireballs can penetrate walls.

One approach to mining Hellstone can be to just drop down to the Hellstone / Ash "floor" and start digging out the Hellstone. Since all Pickaxes are pretty fast and swing continuously, this should deflect most fireballs and kill most Fire Imps that stand in front of the player. One should take care that the Fire Imps spawn above them, by mining as narrowly as possible and preferably straight downwards. With decent armor, an Obsidian Skull and one or more Bands of Regeneration, a player should be able to mine a decent amount of Hellstone before they are killed by the Fire Imps or a Bone Serpent. Also, using a fast pick axe will help deflect fireballs. One must keep in mind, however, that Hellstone Bars are very expensive, and that 6 pieces of Hellstone and 2 pieces of Obsidian are required to forge only 1 bar.

Once you are at the very bottom of the world, a way to effectively suppress Fire Imps spawns - and get Hellstone with less effort and danger - is to deny Fire Imps the right to spawn by not letting them have enough space to do so. As mining Hellstone gives also a lot of Ash Blocks, one can use these blocks to fill the space left by mining. Note that you don't need to fill the space so much, as Fire Imps seem to require a target space 4 blocks high by 3 blocks wide to teleport into a location. Making tunnels 3 blocks high and descending shafts 2 blocks wide is sufficient to prevent spawning.

Using potions
Using an Obsidian Skin Potion and Gills Potion together will allow you to mine in the lava itself. This can keep you safe from many of the spawns (Fire Imps and Bone Serpents being notable exceptions).

Using an Artificial Meteor Biome
If the Player places at least 50 pieces of Meteorite Ore on the screen where they are mining, they can create an artificial Meteor Biome. In the Meteor biome, all monster spawns are replaced by Meteor Heads, which are more predictable, and tend to do less damage, than the naturally spawning creatures of The Underworld. If the Player can withstand the Meteor Head attacks he can mine Hellstone in relative peace.

If this method is used, the Player only needs to take care to move his Meteorite deposit as they mine away from it. Refer to the Meteorite page for tips on safely mining in the Meteor biome.

Required Amounts
There's an entire tier of items that use hellstone, and it can be intimidating to think of how much you'll need to do everything. The following table shows all the items that use Hellstone Bars, from least number of bars to most, and gives the amount of Hellstone you'll need for it.
 * To find out the amount of Obsidian you need, just divide the Hellstone number by 3.