Minecraft/Mining Ores

Your first tools are made of wood. Wood is the worst material of all. The last the shortest and can do the least. The second tier of materials is stone. To gather stone you need a pickaxe.

The stone you see naturally is normal Stone. But if you mine it it will drop as Cobblestone. With Coblestone you can make Stone Tools and Furnaces.

Stone Tools
Stone Tools can be made with the same recipe as their wooden counterparts. Just replace the Wooden Planks with Cobblestone. Cobblestone will last longer, harvest faster and can be used to get Iron Ore.

Furnace
A Furnace can be made with 9 Cobblestone in the crafting grid of the Crafting Table with the central cell empty.

Interact with it to open the Smelting Menu. The Smelting Menu has three fields. The bottom left field is for input of fuel. Coal, Charcoal and any kind or shape of Wood (including your now-obsolete wooden tools) can be used as fuel. However, Coal and Charcoal should be used for most things. The top left field is for input of items to be cooked or smelted. The furnace starts processing after both input fields are filled. In the Smelting Menu you will see an arrow pointing to the right slowly turning white. The fire on the left indicates how much time is left. When you leave the menu you will see a small fire burning in the Furnace. You only have to fill up the fuel and unsmelted items to keep the Furnace going. Because after processing one item the furnace will start processing the next item automatically.

After about 10 seconds one smelting procedure will be done. It will consume 1 unit of fuel. And the item smelted will now be in the output field on the right for you to acquire.

Many items can be processed with the Furnace below follows a list of items to process:

Food
Cooked Food heals more than their raw counterparts.
 * All meat from passive land animals --> Cooked meat
 * All fish except pufferfish --> Cooked fish
 * Potatoes --> Baked potatoes

Ores and Materials
Ores and other material need to be processed first.
 * Raw Iron, Gold, and Copper --> Ingots
 * Sand --> Glass
 * Cobblestone --> Stone
 * Clay ball --> Brick
 * Netherrack --> Nether Brick
 * Clay block --> Teracotta

Night Mobs and getting a bow
If you have enough weapons and armor (enchanted diamond is best, but usually iron suffices) you can stay up in the night to hunt monsters. However, look out for endermen (or don’t) to get ender pearls for the late game. They can teleport, but water is their weakness. If you kill spiders, you can get string, which can craft bows. Flint, sticks, and feathers can then be used to make arrows (or you can kill skeletons to get arrows).

Mining for Iron
The easiest way to find iron is walking through caves. Caves are very dangerous so if you’re not feeling well prepared dig down under height 60 (It is possible to see by pressing F3 on Java and is a world setting on Bedrock) for coal and lots of iron. Make anvils, tools and armor and Iron Golems (good for protection from pillagers at night if you’re living in a village).

More Ore
Besides Iron Ore there is also Gold, Copper, Coal, Diamond, Emerald, Lapis Lazuli, and Redstone.


 * Gold Ore can be smelted in to Gold Ingots to be used to make the same stuff ass with Iron Ingots. Gold tools last far shorter than Iron ones, but are incredibly fast. Gold Ingots are also used in different crafting recipes.
 * Coal Ore is used as great fuel.
 * Diamond Ore should be mined with Iron Pickaxes or better. You get the Diamonds itself from Diamond Ore blocks. So you don't and shouldn't have to smelted it. Diamond is the best material in the overworld.
 * Lapis Lazuli is harvested the same way as Diamonds, and gives multiple pieces per block. Lapis Lazuli is used as a blue dye and for enchanting.
 * Redstone is also harvest the same as Lapis Lazuli and Diamonds. Redstone is use as wire in some devices, acting as Minecraft's version of electricity.
 * Emarald Ore is used as a currency in Villages to trade with the Villagers, and is harvested the same way as Diamonds.

While you can find Coal Ore and Iron Ore close to the surface, you have to go much deeper for Gold, Lapis Lazuli, Diamond and Redstone. While Emerald can only be find in the Extreme Hills biome.

(Optional) Crafting TNT
You can make TNT by using Gunpowder and Sand together in a Crafting Table grid as follows:

You can light the TNT with redstone or fire from a Flint and Steel or Flame enchanted bow. A Flint and Steel is made with a piece of Flint and an Iron Ingot placed side by side in a crafting grid. The Flint and Steel can be used to ignite all flammable objects like Wood, and Leaves. Mobs that walk through fire catch on fire, and animals killed this way drop precooked meat.

After you ignite the TNT it will flash for a few seconds and then explode.