Revision 8

Overview

A decent alternative to a stone pickaxe. But it'll struggle with tougher stone.

Copper Pickaxe is the first metal-tier pickaxe in Windrose. Its item description calls it a decent alternative to the Stone Pickaxe that still struggles with tougher stone, which is the in-game way of saying it is an upgrade but not the final word on mining. In practice it is the specific tool required to mine Foothills Iron Ore, so it is the gate that opens the entire iron chain.

Item Info

Crafting

Loot Sources

The Copper Pickaxe has both guaranteed chest drops in specific Highlands dungeon POIs and a rare drop from the Blackbeard Crew Chest at roughly a 1 percent rate. Neither is a reliable route; the recipe is the practical source, but the guaranteed drops are worth a detour if a player's tool breaks mid-POI.

Vendor Availability

The Copper Pickaxe is not bought or sold by any vendor. The tool is exclusively crafted at a Workbench Lvl 1 or found in the loot sources above.

Why it Matters

The Copper Pickaxe is the specific tool required to mine Foothills Iron Ore. A Stone Pickaxe will not register hits on iron deposits in Foothills quarries, so until the copper tool is crafted the entire iron chain stays locked: no Iron Pickaxe, no Iron Axe, no sulfur access, and no reliable Homemade Gunpowder supply.

Practical order of operations: once the first Smelting Furnace is producing copper ingots reliably, pour the first five ingots into a Copper Pickaxe before anything else. Tools, weapons, and station upgrades will all still be there when you come back, but the iron route does not open at all without this one craft.

Nodes the Copper Pickaxe Handles

• Every node the Stone Pickaxe already handles: Stone, Copper Ore, Clay, and Fertile Soil.

• Foothills Iron Ore deposits. These are the only nodes the Stone Pickaxe cannot hit, so the upgrade path is binary: Stone for Copper nodes and below, Copper for Iron and below.

• Grey boulders blocking Highlands cave routes. Handles these noticeably faster than the Stone Pickaxe thanks to the 140 Durability pool and 270 ATK.

Tips

• Craft the Copper Pickaxe before the Copper Axe if you only have five Copper Ingot to spend. The axe tier is optional for progression; the pickaxe is not.

• A broken Copper Pickaxe mid-quarry run costs five ingots and five wood to replace. Bring the ingredients with you for long sessions rather than round-tripping to base.

• The Iron Pickaxe at 200 Durability and the same 270 ATK is the next clean upgrade. Do not stockpile extra Copper Pickaxes once the Lvl 2 Workbench is ready.

See Also

• Tools

• Stone Pickaxe

• Iron Pickaxe

• Swamp Pickaxe

• Copper Axe

• Copper Ingot

• Foothills Iron Ore

• Workbench

Details

Properties

Crafted By

Crafted at: Workbench

Unlocked By

• DISCOVERY One-handed weapons, copper tools, and other items

• Coastal Jungle

• Copper Ingot

Disassembles Into

Where Found