The Ultimate WoW TBC Classic Mining Guide

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In World of Warcraft, professions are the most efficient way to make gold. Mining is one of the best professions to make gold fast. This guide will explain the most optimal way to level up mining, what mining is, and the best ore to look out for during your adventures.

What is Mining in World of Warcraft?

We all know that mining is one of World of Warcraft’s good money-making professions. It entails the collection of ore using a pickaxe. You can further level your mining skill by smelting the ore into ingots. Sometimes, however, you need to use two different ores to create certain bars or ingots. Mining shares one of the two primary slots for professions that you can do in TBC Classic World of Warcraft.

Mining is lucrative because most other professions need the ingots that miners create. Because of the high demand, you can sell mining recipes/ingots/ore at a high rate on the auction house. The added benefit for miners is the extra resources per mine. These additional resources come in the form of rare gems, motes of earth, etc.

How To Start Mining

Now that we understand what mining is and how it can benefit you let’s go over how you can start this profession.

The Trainers

You will need to be level 5, have a small amount of copper(money), and speak to any of these trainers to begin mining:

Horde

• Makaru in Orgrimmar.
• Brom Killian in Undercity.
• Brek Stonehoof in Thunder Bluff
• Johan Focht in Silverpine Forest.
• Krunn in Durotar.
• Pikkle in Tanaris.
• Belil in Silvermoon City.

Alliance

• Geofram Bouldertoe in Ironforge.
• Gelman Stonehand in Stormwind City.
• Kurdram Stonehammer in Darkshore.
• Matt Johnson in Duskwood.
• Yarr Hammerstone in Dun Morogh.
• Pikkle in Tanaris.
• Muaat in The Exodar.

Power leveling Through Smelting (Expensive)

Is this your second character, and do you wish to skip the mining process? Smelting has you covered.

You can smelt up to level 290 by purchasing raw ore from the auction house. Here is what you will need:

• 1-65 | 110-130x Smelt Copper until you reach 65.
• 65-75 | 70x Smelt Tin. This one will be grey after 75, but you will need these for bronze.
• 75-105 | 70x Smelt Bronze.
• 105-125 | 25-35x Smelt Silver until you get 125.
• 125-155 | 50-65x Smelt Iron until you reach 155
• 155-175 | 20-25x Smelt Gold until you get to 175.
• 175-200 | 40x Smelt Mithril until you reach 200, then visit your trainer and learn Artisan Mining.
• 200-230 | 170-200x Smelt Mithril until you reach 230.
• 230-250 |30-40x Smelt Truesilver until you get 250.
• 250-290 | 140-180x Smelt Thorium until you hit level 290.

From 290, you must mine thorium veins till 300. Smelting is a great way to level up your mining fast, but it is very costly.

If you don’t want to power level your mining, or if you don’t have the money for auction house resources, then follow the rest of this guide.

Leveling Through Mining – Vanilla

Leveling your mining profession requires you to meet any mining trainer to learn the skill and buy a pickaxe. (Or you can check SSEGold’s TBC items list.) Once you have your pickaxe follow this list for the most optimal routes:

Levels 1-65 (Character level 5+)

In WoW TBC Classic, every starter zone will have copper mines. These are the zones to find them:

• Durotar
• Mulgore
• Tirisfal Glades
• Elwynn Forest
• Darkshore
• Dun Morogh

The mobs in this area are low-level, so don’t expect this to be too difficult to farm. You will usually end off with 120 copper by level 65.

Levels 65-125 (Character level 22+)

Before you embark on the next zone, make sure to visit your trainer to level your mining to Journeyman. Without getting Journeyman, you will not level up your skills past level 75.

For 65-125, you must farm either:

• Tin Ore
• Copper Ore (This will only get you to 75)
• Silver Ore

You can find these ores in:

• Hillsbrad Foothills
• Redridge Mountains
• Ashenvale
• The Barrens

The resistance in these areas vary; make sure you don’t travel into any caves alone as you may be ambushed and killed. However, the mobs are still low-level in these zones, and if you approach them one at a time, you will be fine.

Levels 125-175 (Character level 35+)

Again, before you head out to these zones, make sure to visit the trainer to gain the skill; Expert miner. For these levels, you need to farm:

• Iron Ore
• Tin Ore
• Gold Ore

Iron ore is the best ore here, as it sells for the most gold on the Auction House, but it comes at a price. Iron ore is one of the most contested ores in Vanilla World of Warcraft, so expect loads of PvP or people who will steal your mines.

You can find these ores in these locations:

• Arathi Highlands
• Desolace
• Thousand Needles

You can also find them in other locations, but these are the most efficient zones and where you should focus your efforts.

Levels 175-245 (Character level 45+)

Once again, visit your trainer to learn; Artisan Miner. If you don’t, you will not be able to level past 175. The ores you will be focusing on is:

• Mithril Ore
• Truesilver Ore

The levels, at this point, will start getting difficult as most of the mines will be green. As well as the skills leveling slowly, the zones are pretty tricky and highly contested. In a PvP server, you will struggle to find time to focus on these mines without getting attacked by another player. (If you need help, check out our TBC Power Leveling service now.)

These are the most efficient zones to farm Mithril and Truesilver:

• The Hinterlands
• Tanaris
• Un’Goro Crater
• Blasted Lands
• Felwood

Levels 245-275 (Character level 52+)

For these levels, you want to continue with Mithril and Truesilver, but also look out for Thorium Ore.

The zones you will find the ores in are:

• Un’Goro Crater
• Blasted Lands
• Felwood

Keep in mind these mines/ores sell for an extremely high amount on the auction house, so expect a lot of PvP.

Levels 275-300 (Character level 55+)

Levels 275-300 are the last stretch for vanilla classic WoW. For this last part, you will need to continue farming:

• Thorium ore
• Mithril ore

These are the best zones to farm them in:

• Un’goro Crater
• Eastern Plaguelands
• Winterspring
• Burning Steppes

After you’ve reached 300, you have finished Vanilla WoW Classic mining, congratulations!

Leveling Through Mining – TBC Classic

Now that you’ve completed Vanilla WoW’s mining, you must head to Outland (TBC).

Levels 300-350 (Character level 60+)

Once you go through the Dark Portal, you will need to head to either of these trainers to level  up past 300:

• Alliance – Hurnak Grimmord (Honor Hold)
• Horde – Krugosh (Thrallmar)

You will need to farm Fel Iron ore till 325. You can find Fel Iron all along the ridgelines of the mountains in Hellfire Peninsula.

Levels 350-375 (Character level 66+)

350-375 is the last step of this guide. At 350 mining skill, all mines can are accessible except Khorium. In that case, we recommend farming these areas for any ore since all mines can get you to level 375:

• Terrokar Forest
• Zangarmarsh
• Netherstorm

Summary

That should be it for this guide. So you know that mining is the bigger moneymaker in TBC because of the demand for ores/bars for Blacksmithing, Engineering, and Jewelcrafting, you can make your move now. If you don’t want to waste so much time mining, just buy Cheap TBC Gold at SSEGold.com, I’m pretty sure you will have the best experience there.

Good luck on your WoW Classic TBC journey!

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This content is brought to you by Christopher Paige.

Photos provided by the author.