Day 3 | Survival Guide Starbound Guide
Last update: 11 May 2016
On the second day of the game, you learned the basics of combat with the bow and melee weapon., to gather food and cook the simplest dishes to satisfy hunger. On the third day, you will craft your first tools, visit dark caves and play the miner a bit.
Crafting of tools
Although the Matter Manipulator is a very useful tool, which has many useful functions, it unfortunately operates quite slowly, especially when it comes to mining for resources. For that reason, there exist tools that, usually, serve one purpose, but they are the best one for the job, out of all the tools.
In the first place, we will focus on crafting tools. To craft all of them, you are going to need 55x Cobblestone, but mining for this amount with the Matter Manipulator is going to be time-consuming. As for now, collect 10 chunks. Cobblestone can be found on the surface and in most caves. After you have gathered enough, return to your cottage and use the Wooden Crafting Station. Find a Stone Pickaxe and craft one (10x Cobblestone and 20x Wood Planks). This is the simplest of pickaxes, but it will do for deposits at small depths.
With your new tool in your hand, it is time to go back to the quarry. Collect the remaining 45 Cobblestone and take them to the Wooden Crafting Table. Craft a Stone Axe (10x Cobblestone and 15x Wood Planks) and a Stone Hoe (10x Cobblestone and 12x Wood Planks). Leave the remaining materials for later. Stone Axe is ideal for chopping trees and the Stone Hoe is required for soil cultivation, which is going to be covered later on.
Mining
It is time to go deep underground. The aim of this endeavor is to find several materials, like: coal, copper and iron. The exact number of the materials that you need are: 36-56 Iron Ore, 134 Copper Ore and, around 100-200 Coal.
Before you go-a-mining, it is a good idea to prepare several things. First of all, you need to make sure that you have, at least, 5 bits of Cooked Alien Meat on you Then, collect around 40-60 Plant Fibre form the vines and craft them into Bandage, in the crafting screen. You should have 10-15 bandages. They are very useful, because they regenerate your health after they are used. The final important thing is the Torches. To craft 2 torches, you are going to need one Unrefined Wood and a lump of Coal, which you can find on the surface or in shallow caves. Prepare, around, 20 torches and go.
The amount of ores, and their distribution is different from planet to planet. It is possible that on your planet, you will find most of the ores that you need near the very surface, although such deposits are, usually, not abundant. The best method is to start digging. The deeper you dig, the more rare ores you will find. It is best to find a cave and go to its bottom. Where you start digging and get over to the successive caves. Use the torch to mark your path and illuminate the area, while digging. For the needs of the regular movement, use the Flashlight.
It may take some time to mine all of the ores but, they are going to be necessary later in the game. There should not be much problems finding Coal. You can easily find it, in abundance, on the surface. The same goes for Copper Ore. What may be the most problematic is the Iron Ore. It is not that abundant near the surface and in shallow caves, but to find larger deposits, you need to dig deeper. Try not to dig too deep, because you can encounter some more demanding opponents there, than on the surface. If you take any damage, remember that you have the Bandages on you. They will allow you to regenerate the character's health, best before the battle.
Once you have collected the necessary ores, return to the surface and take them to your cottage.