Stevensonbak

When you say "copper pickaxes," do you actually mean you are using PURE copper axes up until iron? Tin Bronze and Bismuth Bronze tools are waaay more resource cost efficient, durable, and fast-working than pure copper ones. On one hand, the copper-to-iron jump must feel like a godly upgrade, but on the other hand, seems like quite a slog! And this is coming from a guy that used to hold out for steel rather than using iron bars for any tools other than anvils and pickaxes (don't do this either!)

In a previous save, I have a similarly deep basement and experienced pretty much what OP is describing, and I concluded that depth not only increases difficulty of the drifters, but also allows them to ignore light levels to spawn, but I never saw this anywhere in writing. Is there any mechanic that makes deep basements non-spawnable, or do you have no choice but to stay above a certain Y level depending on total world height?

Just finished putting together my first iron anvil, it was quite a labor intensive process. With that said, I noticed while messing around in creative mode that you are able spawn in a STEEL anvil; is there a purpose at any point in the current version of the game to forge one, or is it even possible? The wiki doesn't mention the the steel anvil at all, so I just assume it will only be relevant in a future game version, I just don't want to waste my steel on other projects if there is a good reason to prioritize making a steel anvil instead.

This is exactly what I started doing yesterday, it's those "grace periods" and "warm-up time" factors that made me realize two things: A) It's not a horrible idea to "jumpstart" certain high-temp cookjobs with a high-temperature fuel like charcoal and then proceed to use the intended fuel, but it's still relatively inefficient, and B) You get the best bang for your buck for doing larger and uninterrupted cookjobs, as long as you maintain the fuel supply until the job is done. I can see how someone would do this in a situation where fuel sources are scarce, i.e. no ready access to peat or coal and maybe they are far away from trees and/or have a very long sapling growth rate for some reason, so I bet some hardcore desert dweller might benefit from babysitting their campfires in this way when every log is precious. Considering this is a game where there are always dozens of chores to do if you're playing it right, I definitely don't see a situation where I would do this myself even in the very early game, but it does give interesting insight into the cooking mechanics.

Aaah, this completely removes my need to deliberately find coal; for some reason, I had the impression that the steel furnace needed coke to run properly, wish I had known this sooner. Then on a semi-related subject in regards to fuel, I have been using peat for the purpose of cooking and clay forming since it is relatively easy to get with a decent burn time and so-so maximum temperature. Obviously, it is a non-renewable resource and at some point the trips to get it won't be worth it at all, but is it actually more efficient in the long run to just use charcoal for those purposes as soon as possible? I have been saving charcoal exclusively for the purpose of smelting, but I actually started using it for the occasional clayforming and cooking too, am I being wasteful or practical?

To put into perspective how little coal I've come across in my current session, I am well into the Iron age and just finished building my coke furnace in preparation for moving onto steel, and all I have ever found in my world is a couple traces of Lignite that I haven't pursued because the distribution was considered, "miniscule" by the prospecting pick everywhere I looked. I've particularly searched in limestone and sandstone rich biomes, and have even struck diamonds before I've even seen a single deposit of coal anywhere in my world. I also tried loading up a throwaway world with default settings to fly around in, and I still had to work hard to find any coal, only finding a large Lignite node by pure luck after flying around at full speed for 10 minutes. Is there a type of stone or biome where coal is particularly abundant? I'm tired of making charcoal and digging up peat, let alone not being able to move onto steel