Ores

From Minetest

This page is an overview page over the ores found in Minetest Game. It is accurate for version 5.1.0. Later versions may differ!

General facts

All ores are generated by replacing stone at a certain height and always are formed in clusters.

Underground ores

The underground ore generation is simple: The deeper you get, the more you find. Ores generate at a height of Y = 64 or lower, starting with coal ore and becoming more and more valuable as you go deeper. At a height of Y = -4096 or lower, all ores can be found at their peak probability. Ores are generated in 2 variants: small cluster and big cluster. The small cluster variant has clusters with a few ores and is usually less likely to appear and is found in the underground at a higher height. The big cluster variant has usually more ores per cluster and is more likely to appear, but found deeper.

Sky ores

All ores can also be generated in large numbers at Y=1025 or above (i.e. high in the skies), as long there is stone. Unlike the underground ore generation ores will not gradually become more common as you go higher because they are common at Y=1025 or above already.

Note that ores still require stone to be generated at all. This means you won't find any ores in the map generators v5, v6, v7, valleys and flat at default settings because no stone is generated so high. But if you use custom map generator settings (most notably, the v7's floatlands), a custom modded map generator or the fractals map generator which generates stone at these extreme heights, you can find plenty of all ores at this height.

Ore-free zone

No ores are generated between Y = 65 and Y = 1024 inclusive.

Ores overview

Default ore distribution

This is the ore distribution for all mapgens except v6, as of version 5.1.0:

Ore type Drops Weakest required tool Ores in cluster[1] Small at Y ≤ Big at Y ≤ Sky at Y ≥ Small chance[2] Big chance[3]
Coal ore.png Coal Ore Coal.png 1 Coal Lump Woodpick.png Wooden Pickaxe 8-30 64 0 1025 0.59% 0.41%
Copper ore.png Copper Ore Copper lump.png 1 Copper Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 4-5 −64 −128 1025 0.14% 0.41%
Tin ore.png Tin Ore Tin Lump.png 1 Tin Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 4-5 −64 −128 1025 0.14% 0.41%
Iron ore.png Iron Ore Iron lump.png 1 Iron Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 5-29 −128 −256 1025 0.41% 0.06%
Gold ore.png Gold Ore Gold lump.png 1 Gold Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 3-5 −256 −512 1025 0.06% 0.03%
Mese ore.png Mese Ore Mese crystal.png 1 Mese Crystal Bronzepick.png Bronze Pickaxe 3-5 −512 −1024 1025 0.03% 0.11%
Diamond ore.png Diamond Ore Diamond.png 1 Diamond Bronzepick.png Bronze Pickaxe 4 −1024 −2048 1025 0.11% 0.09%
Mese.png Mese Block Mese.png 1 Mese Block Bronzepick.png Bronze Pickaxe 3-5 −2048 −4096 1025 0.09% 0.01%

v6

This is ore distributions for the v6 mapgen, as of 5.1.0.

Ore type Drops Weakest required tool Ores in cluster[1] Small at Y ≤ Big at Y ≤ Sky at Y ≥ Small chance[2] Big chance[3]
Coal ore.png Coal Ore Coal.png 1 Coal Lump Woodpick.png Wooden Pickaxe 8-27 64 0 1025 0.59% 0.12%
Iron ore.png Iron Ore Iron lump.png 1 Iron Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 5-27 0 −64 1025 0.12% 0.41%
Copper ore.png Copper Ore Copper lump.png 1 Copper Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 4-5 −16 −64 1025 0.17% 0.41%
Tin ore.png Tin Ore Tin Lump.png 1 Tin Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 4-5 −32 −128 1025 0.14% 0.06%
Gold ore.png Gold Ore Gold lump.png 1 Gold Lump Stonepick.png Stone Pickaxe 3-5 −64 −256 1025 0.41% 0.11%
Mese ore.png Mese Ore Mese crystal.png 1 Mese Crystal Bronzepick.png Bronze Pickaxe 3-5 −64 −256 1025 0.41% 0.11%
Diamond ore.png Diamond Ore Diamond.png 1 Diamond Bronzepick.png Bronze Pickaxe 4 −128 −256 1025 0.06% 0.11%
Mese.png Mese Block Mese.png 1 Mese Block Bronzepick.png Bronze Pickaxe 3 −1024 nowhere 1025 < 0.01% 0%
  1. 1.0 1.1 This is the typical number of ores. It can be smaller if other structures (like dungeons) generate inside near ores and destroy them. It can be seemingly larger if two clusters generate close to each other
  2. 2.0 2.1 Chance for any given node to turn into this ore (small cluster). This number was calculated with the ore_info mod
  3. 3.0 3.1 Chance for any given node to turn into this ore (big cluster). This number was calculated with the ore_info mod