New World Mining Guide Explained

Photo courtesy of Amazon Studios

New World is heavily focused on professions. Players work together to upgrade Settlements and even the different crafting stations throughout the town. The game has multiple gathering professions as well, including the notorious Mining ability. As with every fantasy MMORPG, there will always be some type of Mining, Smelting, and Blacksmithing. New World is similar to Mining, Smelting, and different types of crafting. Players will use the ore for Engineering, Armoring, and Weaponsmithing.

For today's focus, we'll be targeting Mining. Players will of course need a pickaxe, and we'd advise upgrading to the Iron version fairly quickly. Once you do, the patterns for Mining are different than most MMORPGs. While in games like World of Warcraft, players unlock certain nodes or types of veins and almost exclusively mine those nodes to continue their skill progression. While the system in New World is similar, players can continually grow their Mining progression while simply mining boulders. Players don't need to find iron, silver, or the highest unlocked node to grow their skill. They could still mine boulders all the way to the top. It would just take longer.

So here is our guide for Mining in New World.

New World Mining Guide Explained

Iron ore can almost spawn anywhere, mostly in hilly areas, obviously it grows the best up high near mountain peaks, while silver and gold will grow inside of caves. Players will have discovered a few different caves while on their journey, no matter which area or settlement you start in. These are probably your first spot to find these nodes.

The reality is you want to have a certain level of mining skill before you leave for a new area. The higher-level areas are rated for level 25 through level 35. Those will eventually increase to 36-45, 25-40, and 50-60+.

It's a good idea to hit a certain level before adventuring on. If you don't want to miss out on most of the nodes when you're running around, players want to hit level 50. Here is a list of all the metals, and elemental nodes and at what level you need to mine them.

  • Iron Vein - N/A
  • Silver Vein - 10
  • Seeping Stone - 20
  • Gold Vein - 45
  • Starmetal Vein - 100
  • Lodestone - 105
  • Platinum Vein - 110
  • Orichalcum Vein - 175
  • Blightcrag - 50
  • Earthcrag - 50
  • Lifejewel - 50
  • Scorchstone - 50
  • Shockspire - 50
  • Soulspire - 50
  • Springstone - 50

Hitting level 50 allows you to grab all the elemental nodes while also being able to grab every node up to gold. That means you're only going to miss the bigger stuff, and to reach level 100+ is going to take a large amount of dedication. Players will need to spend hours and days simply working on leveling mining if they want to hit that level. Even hitting level 50 is a bit of a time constraint, but it's much easier to obtain. And once you hit level 50, you can focus on questing and hit most of the nodes you come across.

As mentioned before you don't need to find specific nodes to level. So in the beginning, you'll need to smash a lot of boulders and rocks in between your nodes. Since I started in Windsward, I can give you some great spots to farm. Toward the eastern side of Windsward, there is a small mountain range surrounding the starting zone. Players can find two different caves, one for the wolves and one for a colossus bear. Start at the lower range, where the bear is, and you can circle the cave and surrounding mountain for nodes. Then make your way up north toward the cave with the wolves. Both areas have surrounding cliffs that spawn a lot of iron nodes. You can circle between these spots, making sure to mine boulders as well. This will take you to level 50.

Once you hit level 50, you'll want to move to a higher-level zone. These have a better chance at spawning metal nodes and elemental nodes. Take Cutlass Keys, players can focus on the northeastern part of the zone, staying in the mountain range. It's important to be close to the level of the mobs around this area, as you'll continue to aggro them and ruin your farming experience. There are multiple caves in the range, so bounce between them. Make sure to continue to farm boulders as you move around. There is a lot of competition, so you could waste a lot of time, running around not finding metal nodes.

At the end of the day, you'll just have to keep grinding, as mining and logging are two of the slowest to build. It's also worth noting what type of bonuses you'll receive in each area. If you level up your territory, you have faster gathering speed, so it might be worth questing in a zone first, leveling up your bonuses then spending a set amount of time gathering. You can also craft or buy items with gathering bonuses as well, so planning and prepping is just as important as just mindlessly farming.