Mining guide: enchants, the tree and where to mine

Which pickaxe enchants to take first, how to set the Mining Tree for energy, XP or money, and how to keep your mining speed up. The enchant order and keystone advice are a starting point: they come from what each enchant and node pays, and Map 5 balance is new.

How mining pays

Every ore block you break pays three things:

• Ore, which sells itself. The cash arrives as a money note you claim in a safe zone. See Ore Values.
• Ancient Energy, stored on the pickaxe. It pays for enchant levels at the Wormhole and for pickaxe prestige.
• Mining XP, which levels you. Every level up to 100 is also a Mining Tree point.

A pickaxe has an energy capacity. When it is full you cannot mine with it until you spend the energy at the Wormhole or take it out with /extract, which is free in a safe zone. If you die you keep the pickaxe, but the energy stored on it drops, and PvP is on in the mines. Spend or extract before you carry a lot. See Death & Item Loss.

Your first 10,000 blocks each day pay 100% increased XP, energy and ore, plus double shard chance. Only blocks you break yourself count. See Daily Bonuses.

Break time is 2000ms divided by your speed, so faster mining raises all three at once. Bonuses come as "increased" (they add together) or "more" (each one multiplies). Increased vs More explains the difference. /buffs lists every bonus you have right now.

Pick a goal and build for it:

• Energy while you are still enchanting and prestiging a pickaxe.
• XP while you are under the day's level cap. At the cap, mining pays 50% increased Ancient Energy.
• Money when you want cash. The money guide compares mining with the other ways to earn.

Enchant order for a new pickaxe

The Wormhole is the machine on the summit west of spawn. Hold a pickaxe with enough stored energy, drop it in (Q), and left-click an option on the ring to roll it. Each option shows its chance first. A failed roll costs the energy and nothing else. An option you roll comes back as the same enchant until it is maxed, so you can keep levelling the one you want.

A proc enchant has a chance to fire each time you break a block. Powerball, Shatter, Super Breaker, Transfuse, Earthquake and Feed are procs. Efficiency and Energy Collector are always on.

When more than one of these is on the ring, take them in this order.

1. Efficiency. 8% increased mining speed per level. Everything else you earn scales with blocks per minute.
2. Energy Collector. 10% increased Ancient Energy per ore, per level. Energy pays for every other enchant.
3. Feed. One level. It refills your hunger while you mine, and you need a nearly full hunger bar to regenerate health.
4. Powerball. The blocks its balls break pay like blocks you mine yourself: ore, energy, XP and shards.
5. Momentum, if you mine in long sittings. See "Keeping your speed" below.
6. Lucky, once the pickaxe has two or more proc enchants. It is 10% more chance per level for every proc on the same item, so it is worth more with each proc you add.

Two more are worth taking when they come up. Super Breaker breaks your next 5 to 10 blocks instantly. Fracture adds mining progress to the ores next to each one you break, and the blocks it finishes pay in full.

If you want money, move these up:

• Ore Magnet. 20% more ore drops per level.
• Shatter. Harvests a cube of ore around the block you mined, up to 7x7x7, for full ore.
• Transfuse. 10% chance per level to upgrade an ore one tier. Top-tier ore drops double.

If you want shards, take Shard Discovery: 50% more chance to find shards per level.

The Godly enchants do not roll at the Wormhole. They come from enchant orbs. Warp Miner is 10% more XP per level from ore in the mines, Earthquake breaks a 3x3 column 5 blocks deep that pays like hand-mined blocks, and Energy Battery lets the pickaxe hold more energy before it is full.

Pickaxe Enchants has the full table, and each enchant has its own page.

What each proc pays

This decides most builds.

So Powerball and Earthquake are the procs for energy and XP, and Shatter is the proc for money. A few things give Shatter blocks a small share of energy and XP: the Residual Knowledge prestige perk and some Mining Tree nodes. Without one of those, Shatter adds nothing to your energy or your level.

Blocks broken by procs do count toward pickaxe prestige.

The mining tree

/miningtree opens it. You get one point per mining level, up to 100, and your stats stay with you when you change pickaxes.

• Use auto-spend until you know the tree. /miningtree auto energy, xp, money or mixed spends every point for you, now and on each level up. New players start on Energy.
• Switch preset when your goal changes. Refunds and full resets are free, and choosing a preset re-spends every point. It replaces your whole tree, including any keystone you pathed to by hand. XP while you are under the level cap, then Energy or Money once you hit it, is a sensible default.
• Proc Chance and Mining Speed are worth a detour on any build. Proc Chance is 1.6% increased per small node for all your mining enchants, and Mining Speed is 1.8% per small node.
• Skip the Extract Tax wheel unless you extract out in the mines. Extracting in a safe zone is already free. The wheel is ten nodes that only help when you /extract outside one.
• Auto-spend never takes a keystone. You path to those yourself, which turns auto-spend off.

The four keystones each change a rule and carry a cost. Keystones & Notables has their full text.

From Ascension I (/ascend, open from day 12) the tree gets a second page with six mining classes.

Mining armour

There is no mining armour set. Armour enchants such as Goldvein, Hermes' Pace and Touch of Plutus do not exist, so armour is for combat. Your mining stats come from the Mining Tree, your pickaxe's enchants and perks, jewels and trims.

Keeping your speed

• Efficiency is the base. Keep it levelled.
• Momentum is a timer. It gains 0.5 seconds for each block you mine, up to 45 minutes, and gives its full 10% increased mining speed per level only when full. It drains when you stop mining and resets after 15 minutes idle. Filling it from empty takes 5,400 blocks, so it rewards long sittings and does little on a short visit.
• Mining Speed nodes on the tree add to the same total.
• Ore one tier above your pickaxe breaks at 1.8x the time. A speed drop after changing mines is usually that.
• Speed tops out at one block per tick. /buffs shows at speed cap when you are there, and more speed past it does nothing.

Mining Speed has the full list of sources.

Mines too dark? On Java, turn Brightness up in Video Settings. Bedrock players have /fullbright. See AncientsMod & the Resource Pack.

Where to mine

The highest mine you can enter, with a pickaxe of its tier. Energy and sell price per block rise with every ore, from 16 energy on coal to 236 on ancient debris. The Mines lists unlock levels and Your Pickaxe lists what each tier breaks. /mines opens the warp menu and shows the level each mine needs. Pickaxes up to diamond are in the Pickaxes stall of /shop. A levelled pickaxe can mine one tier up, but at 1.8x the break time, so buy the next pickaxe when your level allows it.

Calcite Caverns, from level 100, with a diamond pickaxe or better. An iron pickaxe at pickaxe level 40 works, but slower. Warp in from /mines. Calcite sells for $10.94 each, more than any raw ore, pays 225 energy and counts double toward pickaxe prestige. With a Netherite pickaxe the caverns pay 2x XP, energy and ore. You start with 10 minutes a day. /calcite shows your daily block threshold: mine it and tomorrow's allowance goes up by 3 minutes. See Calcite Caverns.

Meteorites land in the overworld and pay a bundle of ore and energy on every swing. Nobody owns one: anyone who swings at it takes ore out of it, and it is gone when it is empty. Showers bring several at once and are the only meteorites that pay emerald. Meteors & Meteorites has the timers.

Mining Competitions and Mining Rush run in every mine on timers. When chat announces one, keep mining in the mine for your level. Mining Events has what they pay.

Renting a pickaxe (/rentals) lets you mine with one that has more enchants and prestige than your own. You must meet the pickaxe's own level requirement, and a netherite pickaxe needs Ascension 2 and level 102. Starting a rental is free. The owner takes a cut they set, and the server takes a fee on what you mine: 20% on the best pickaxe tier the current level cap allows, 10% one tier below and nothing two or more below. The rental ends if you stop mining for 15 minutes, log out or die. See Pickaxe Rentals.

Next

• Pickaxe prestige guide: when to prestige and which perks to pick.
• Vaults of Plouton guide: the doors that open in the ore wall while you mine.
• Mining: the reference page for the whole loop.