Finding Iron?

[Guedez]

Need 100 ores to research Smithing, needs Smithing to make the first drill...
You need to luck it out?

[Unit 744]

A friend and I mapped out most of the biomes by spawning in a modern drill and noting the levels at which ores spawned. The best place to find iron ore appears to be in the desert, 21-24 levels below the surface.

[SLG-Dennis]

You can use any ores for Smithing, though.

[Guedez]

Originally posted by SLG-Dennis:

You can use any ores for Smithing, though.

But that does not preclude that you need ores to get the drill that you need to get ores. There should be a lame drill made with just basic engineering
Or let you use crushed iron ore, something I am swimming on

[SLG-Dennis]

It's intended that you need to find a bit of starter ore, which often can be find on the surface as well :)

[Guedez]

Are you sure ore is spawning on the surface? So long I only ever saw crushed ore (shovel), not 'ore ore' (pick)

[Blubb340]

"21-24 levels below the surface." do you mean 21-24 blocks below the point you start digging or below point 0 (water level)?

[SLG-Dennis]

Below the point you start digging if its a natural block.

[⎛⎝Tiùwilo⎠⎞]

Please for the love of all that's holy include some crappy wooden starter prospecting drill that uses mining labor to craft.

[Agent707]

Originally posted by SLG-Dennis:

It's intended that you need to find a bit of starter ore, which often can be find on the surface as well :)

No more ore on the surface. Sorry. You won't find your first block until you dig. DIG DIG!

[Chaos]

I started a single player map with a seed of 0 at 172x172 size. Not only are there an amazing number of old redwood trees (forests of them) but the first desert I dug down on I ran into massive iron seams at about 20 depth below the surface. I'm not seeing a difficulty with finding ores myself.

[Juspar]

Originally posted by SLG-Dennis:

Below the point you start digging if its a natural block.

What if you're digging into the side of a mountain? Is it the entry point, or the point above your current location?

[SLG-Dennis]

The highest natural block at any given position.

[Other]

Finding Iron ore has zero luck involved. Every desert has two layers of Iron ore that cover 100% of the biome, with the top layer starting 20-25 blocks down from the natural surface, as others have stated. The layer will track the original natural surface exactly as it goes across the biome, so a jump of more than four blocks in the original topography may look like a break in the layer, but it really means you need to go further up or down at that spot. Their thickness varies, though, but the normal thickness is 4 blocks each (you can get thinner, or much thicker, near the edge of the desert biome).

Surface ore is also possible - look for copper ore near the base of really tall cliffs in the Ice and Tundra biomes. I've found it in maybe one world in five recently (it used to be more common). Exposed gold is theoretically possible, but since gold is normally found deeper than copper, it takes a taller cliff, and from a distance gold ore isn't distinctive, while copper is.

[Maphias]

Originally posted by SLG-Dennis:

It's intended that you need to find a bit of starter ore, which often can be find on the surface as well :)

yeah I have never found ore on top since the update that brought the crushed ores

[SLG-Dennis]

That was indeed removed, though my post you quoted is nearly three years old :)