In the world of Windrose, you’ll be collecting a ton of stuff: from dodo meat and eggs (used for cooking) to clay and wood for your first crafts. But there’s one resource you’ll need right from the start: copper. If you’ve ever played a survival sandbox, you know: copper is essential. It’s the same story here.
Spoiler: copper is required in a ton of early recipes, from tools to basic weapons. We’ll tell you where to find it and how to turn ore into full-fledged copper ingots.
Table of Contents
Where to find copper in Windrose: Cave Map
Copper deposits are hidden in caves. The easiest way to find them is to open your map and look for the pickaxe icon. This is a marker for a cave containing copper veins. Go there, enter, and mine.
Important: Windrose uses procedural world generation. The layout of caves may vary for each player. But the principle remains the same: look for the pickaxe icon.
Stone Copper Pickaxe: Crafting Recipe
Copper is mined with a pickaxe. Even the most basic one—a stone one—will do. It’s crafted on a workbench using a simple recipe: 3 wood + 3 stone. That’s it, you can mine veins.
Cave Lamp: Where to Get It and How to Fuel It
The caves in Windrose are pitch black. Without a light source, you simply won’t see anything. Be sure to bring a lamp with you.
Where can I get a lamp early on? Head to the Pirate’s Wrecks landmark—there’s a completed lamp inside the chest. It doesn’t last long, so act quickly. Collect the ore in batches before the light goes out.
Incidentally, the lamp is fueled by animal fat. Kill an animal and you’ll get fat. Keep a couple of spares in your inventory.
Enemies in Copper Caves: What Weapons to Take
Not all caves are empty. Enemies may be waiting inside, from small creatures to more powerful opponents. So it’s best not to venture unarmed.
Smelting Copper into Ingots in 3 Steps
Minced ore can’t be used immediately—it needs to be smelted. To do this, you’ll need a smelter (crafted on a stone and clay workbench). Throw the ore in, add fuel, and you’ll get copper ingots. Now you can craft proper items.
Copper mining in Windrose is a simple process if you know where to go and what to bring. Master this step, and your survival will be much more enjoyable.
Smelting Furnace in Windrose: How to Make Copper Ingots
Minced copper? Great. But the ore itself is useless—it needs to be smelted. To do this, you’ll need a smelter. And one more thing: charcoal. Without it, the process won’t start.
Charcoal Furnace and Smelting Furnace: What to Craft
First, craft a charcoal furnace (20 clay + 20 wood). Throw wood in and you get charcoal. One unit of wood yields one charcoal plus ash (useful later).
Next, build a smelting furnace: 15 clay and 30 stone. Both devices are created in construction mode. Place them in a convenient location, for example, next to a workbench.
Smelting Process: Ore, Coal, Fuel, Time
Load 4 pieces of copper ore and 1 piece of charcoal into the smelting furnace. Start it. That’s it, all you have to do is wait. Incidentally, furnaces don’t work quickly. If you don’t want to sit back, install two or three of each type. This will speed up production significantly.
Using Copper Ingots: Crafting Weapons and Tools
Ingots are the basis for a ton of useful items. They are needed at the workbench, in the gunsmith’s workshop, and even in construction mode.
Workbench Recipes: Bullets, Nails, Axe
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Copper Bullets – 1 Ingot (5 at a time)
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Copper Nails – 1 Ingot (also 5)
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Fast Travel Bell – 10 Ingots + 3 Ropes (base teleport, item)
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Copper Axe – 5 Ingots + 5 Wood
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Copper Pickaxe – 5 Ingots + 5 Wood
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Shovel – 3 Ingots + 10 Wood
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Copper Cauldron – 5 Ingots (cooking, of course)
Copper Weapons: Rapier, Sabre, Pistol
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Club – 5 Ingots + 10 Wood
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Rapier – 7 Ingots + 2 Rough Leather
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Sabre – 7 Ingots + 2 Rough Leather
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Pistol – 5 Ingots + 10 Wood
Copper Buildings: Goat and Cutting Table
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Sawing Saw – 10 Ingots + 20 Wood
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Cutting Table – 2 Ingots + 10 Wood
You’ve mastered the full cycle: from the stone pickaxe to the copper saber and pistol. Now you’re not just a defenseless survivor, but a fully-fledged master. Pirates? We’ll give you a proper welcome.
Copper Cave in Windrose: How to Read the Map
The pickaxe icon on the map isn’t a single vein, but a cluster. Such a cave typically contains 6-12 copper veins, and at deeper levels, tin and iron are mixed in. The most generous starting caves are located at the junction of forest and rock biomes. The spawn rate is significantly higher there. Cleared a cave with a stone pickaxe and emerged with 30-40 ore? That’s fine. A copper pickaxe will net you 60+ for the same route.
Speaking of routes, by the way. Place manual markers on the map after clearing the caves—ore will respawn, but not instantly. Check back in 2-3 in-game days, and the veins will be back.
Where to get clay in Windrose: banks and swamps
Clay is used in the smelter, charcoal kiln, and ceramics. Consumption is high from the first few hours, so you’ll need several extraction points:
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River banks—the richest deposits. Gray-brown hummocks stick out right at the water’s edge and can be dug up with a shovel in seconds.
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Swampy lowlands—the yield is smaller, but the clay comes with reeds and frogs (the latter are useful for cooking).
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The coast near the Pirate Remains—conveniently combines with collecting the first lamp.
One hummock yields 3-5 clay. Ten minutes of farming on a normal bank is enough to get the smelting furnace (15) and the charcoal kiln (20). No more.
Boar Hunting in Windrose: Loot and Tactics
Boars in Windrose are the main source of rough leather (two pieces are needed for a rapier and a sabre) and lamp fat. They graze in groups of 2-4 animals in deciduous forests and meadows at the foot of the hills. They are rarely seen in coniferous biomes, as this is deer territory.
Drops from the carcass:
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Raw Meat – 3-5 pieces
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Rough Leather – 1-2 pieces
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Animal Fat – 1-2 pieces
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Tusks (rare drop) – used for jewelry and traps
It’s best to kill a boar with a bow, from a distance. In close combat, it can take up to 40% of its HP in one charge—an unpleasant surprise for those who come out with a bare stone axe. If you don’t have a bow, attack the boar from behind and strike before it turns around.
45-minute farming route: copper, clay, boars
A total of 45-55 minutes of real time. The result is a full supply of resources for two or three crafting cycles.
Repairing a Pickaxe in Windrose: Saving Resources
A stone pickaxe lasts about 80 hits, a copper one about 200. A broken tool cannot be repaired, but taking it to a repair shop before reaching the red zone is possible and necessary. A repair bench repairs a pickaxe for 30-40% of the crafting cost: a stone pickaxe gives 1 wood and 1 stone, a copper one gives 2 ingots and 2 wood. Compared to crafting from scratch, the savings are 2.5 times. Significant.
Three rules that will save you dozens of hits:
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Don’t swing your pickaxe at trees and bushes. Durability drains, and the effect is zero—there’s an axe for that.
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Keep two pickaxes in your belt. One is at 100%, the other is finishing off the veins. Switch when the first one drops below 20%.
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Repair until you reach the red zone, not in it. In the red zone, each hit removes double the durability—the game intentionally penalizes greed.
And one more thing. Ash from the charcoal kiln (the same one everyone considers trash) is used as a component in improved tool lubricant—it gives +15% durability for one repair cycle. Don’t throw it away.
