Mining

mine
mine <ore>
professions mining     (the Professions window, on Mining)

Mining digs ore from the veins that run through the rock: the hills, mountains and deserts, the forests, and the caves, mines and dungeons away from the towns. About one room in sixteen of those zones has a vein. Like the herbs, easier ores lie in easier zones, by the level of the monsters there, and a vein comes back when its zone resets.

Click Mine on a vein where you stand, or type "mine" ("gather" works too). It takes a moment; moving, a fight or another command stops it. You need the Mining skill the vein asks for, and you learn as you mine, as with every profession (see PROFESSIONS). An easy vein more often gives two lumps.

Now and then a vein gives a gem of its tier as well: the first of the pair about one vein in twenty, the second, rarer one about one in a hundred.

Ore and gems stack and weigh nothing. Smithing forges armor and weapons from the ore (see SMITHING); Jewelcrafting makes jewelry from the gems and a little ore (see JEWELCRAFTING). Turn on Ores on the zone map (or "Show ore veins on the zone map" in the Professions window) to see the veins in the rooms you have explored.