Manual pulverizer

[InternetDragon]

As it says in the title. For this, you would need several components.

- Rope (Needs to be replaced occasionally)

-Handle (1 stick with 1 resin)

-Stone pulverizer (Crafted with 3 whole stone blocks [must be a hard stone like granite, andesite, etc] + hammer and chisel)

-Eye hook (needs to be crafted at smithable temperatures in the grid with the stone pulverizer)

-Manual pulverizer framework

-Pulverizer caps

-Pulley wheel (needs to be oiled with fat every so often)

 

First, place down the 4-block tall framework. Put in the pulley wheel. Then, put in 2 rope, and attach the handle to it. Add the eye hook stone pulverizer.  Add your caps.

Once it has been assembled, place your crushable item on the base, and then pull down on the handle. It takes a bit, but then you can release it at full height to crush the item instantly. For items with a decimal chance to drop an item (iron nuggets with an 0.3 and the like), 10 must be placed in at once. 

[Bruno Willis]

I'd prefer to see the very basic version: a hollowed out log set upright, and a pole with a metal cap (one pulverizer cap). You just stand there, smashing down into the hollow log until the thing inside is turned to dust/pulp. Not efficient at all, but enough if you are determined not to get mechanical. 

They were a common tool IRL, I think. 

[ijkdenem]

i like this idea. i suggested something like this to but it was for churning butter. also i wanted butter added to the game as well. this would have given us another dairy option like a bread & butter/ toast kind of food to eat. to automate it attach it to the helve hammer thingy.

[The Lerf]

I'd first ask what the point of a manual pulverizer is, from a game design perspective. Is there anything that it solves that the regular hammer or quern can't? 

I feel like the suggestion here could be reframed as adding a manual hand crank to add off an axle to power a single machine, albeit slowly. Like manually turning the quern. 

[InternetDragon]

6 hours ago, The Lerf said:

I'd first ask what the point of a manual pulverizer is, from a game design perspective. Is there anything that it solves that the regular hammer or quern can't? 

For when you don't have a lot of linen for a windmill early game

6 hours ago, The Lerf said:

I feel like the suggestion here could be reframed as adding a manual hand crank to add off an axle to power a single machine, albeit slowly. Like manually turning the quern. 

Very good idea.

[The Lerf]

5 hours ago, InternetDragon said:

For when you don't have a lot of linen for a windmill early game

Right, but what do you need to pulverize in the early game? The only things that are pulverizable are the ingredients for refractory bricks and dyes. Refractory bricks are a late game item, and dyes are kind of a mid-game customization option. 

[MKMoose]

The pulverizer being locked away behind automation is arguably a perfectly fine limitation, so I'm not sure what the point of a manual pulverizer would be besides short-circuiting mechanical progression and rendering the mechanized pulverizer borderline useless except for easier crushing of large quantities of materials for refractory bricks, unless some other function gets aded to it. Additionally, this proposition includes a number of different components and issues which would cause inconsistency with preexisting features and introduce excess complexity where it's not necessary:

1. Why should the rope be replaced regularly if there are no similar mechanics in the game?
2. Why should the pulley be oiled regularly if all other mechanical parts in the game only use fat in the crafting process?
3. Eye hook being crafted in the grid at temperatures at which the material [which material?] is workable has been deliberately made impossible in 1.22, because for the vast majority of items it never made much sense that they were usable at those temperatures.

If anything, it would arguably be much better to allow to manually provide a small amount of power to mechanical components, presumably with the use of something like a treadwheel (doubly useful if it can be powered by both players and animals). Or if not that, then at the very least make the manual pulverizer just utilize the existing pulverizer frame instead of a completely separate construction.

Alternatively, especially with herbalism on the horizon, I would expect to see something like mortar and pestle to allow grinding up some things in small quantities that don't make much sense in neither the comically large quern that we have in the game, nor in a large pulverizer (including sulfur, charcoal, potentially dyes like lapis lazuli). A large enough mortar could technically be used for butter churning as well, though doing it in a barrel would likely make more sense. An edge mill could also be a neat addition for making black powder, extracting oil from oil-bearing seeds (e.g. linseed oil from flax) and maybe some other stuff.

Edited February 27 by MKMoose

[ijkdenem]

On 2/26/2026 at 10:03 PM, The Lerf said:

Right, but what do you need to pulverize in the early game? The only things that are pulverizable are the ingredients for refractory bricks and dyes. Refractory bricks are a late game item, and dyes are kind of a mid-game customization option. 

quartz and stuff like that. i personally hate having to buy all my glass cuz windmills are a tedious pain in the arse to make.

[The Lerf]

Are you playing modded or vanilla? You don't need to crush quartz in order to make glass blocks in unmodded VS. You can put quartz chunks directly into the bloomery.

[Teh Pizza Lady]

On 2/26/2026 at 8:56 AM, The Lerf said:

I feel like the suggestion here could be reframed as adding a manual hand crank to add off an axle to power a single machine, albeit slowly. Like manually turning the quern.

Good idea, but make it cost satiety points the harder a machine is to turn.