First Iron Tool: Pick or Hoe?

[ThePowerofTower]

I'm just coming up on 3 iron bars in my current area, and I'm really starting to wonder whether it is worth it to make a pick to start. I haven't seen this as a topic since the changes to seeds, so I figured I'd poll around for an idea.

My reasoning so far is that the pick won't do me much good; I enjoy caving, so anything I need pre-diamond, specifically, iron and coal, I can use a stone pick on. So I'm starting to seriously consider a hoe to get a good flow of hemp coming in for my windmill.

But then I got to thinking that perhaps anything I would make with hemp (like a windmill) wouldn't matter anyways until I can get to the nether, which requires me to find diamond. So then the question is, is it worth delaying the pick to start a farm if only to gather hemp, and really nothing else?

What do you guys do? Anyone take a Shears start, for that sweet, sweet cut leather/grass? Or... Axe, I guess?

[DiamondArms]

I figure that hoe is most important for the first iron tool. Its easier to get to than an iron pick.

Reasons:
1) Self-sufficient food: farming pumpkins/melons for seeds->eggs.
2) Hemp: getting enough hemp to make a windmill is a decently long journey. the earlier the start, the better.
3) Windmill: Millstones are still useful pre-nether. Wheat can spawn in dungeon chests and be ground up for flour. Along with (1), this helps with food supply and reduced consumption a lot.
4) Pumpkins: Jack-Lanterns are slightly brighter than torches for the cost of one pumpkin. They're also not reliant on having a wall or floor to stick to. Overhead lighting!

[Jesar]

Pick for me, and with no hesitation.

I always make a pick first, then strip mine a little for enough iron to make another pick and a hoe. I do this to start stockpiling stone for the nether, and before iron pick stockpiling stone is not an option.

My base, logical reasoning for pick over hoe is that iron is a very, very mining heavy resource to acquire early on, and a pick is by far the most powerful way to mine. So staying on the cutting edge of mining tech is crucial for efficiency. Wanting a hoe to speed up mechanical power doesn't make much sense to me because farming enough hemp to make a windmill takes so long already that starting one iron pick earlier doesn't make much of a difference. Also, when you sacrifice the iron pick, that "one iron pick sooner" is a lot longer because you will have to find more caves, scout them, light them up and mine them out, all with stone level mining technology.

I definitely go for the hoe immediately after I have enough iron for a second pick and a hoe, then make the hoe first and let my pick iron smelt while I make the pumpkin and hemp farms.

[Daisjun]

Pick just because I feel it's the biggest time saver out of the two.

We also had a discussion about this a while ago. Lot of interesting arguments:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=7917

All in all though it really comes down to your play style and what YOU think is more important.

[julkwiec]

After about a year of ragequitting I have finally reached the point where you have to decide what to do with your iron. I'm going for shears - they give you ability to herd animals and therefore gain wool and milk. Vine traps ale also cool.

[Niyu]

I also prefeer the pick first.
In my case it's because mining coal with stone is just painfully slow. And with enougth coal exploring caves for more iron becomes considerably easier. So when I make my first pickaxe in my next mining trip I ussually gather enougth iron for another pickaxe and the hoe.
Then it's just a matter of finding pumkins and chickens. At that moment I start worring about mecanical power and I let my hemp grow while i'm looking for diamonds.

[FlowerChild]

Yeah, I think the pick is pretty much a given as it ups the rate at which you can acquire more iron and thus get additional iron tools. Any other and your setting yourself up for much slower progress in getting a full set of iron tools.

I think the more interesting choice is for the 2nd iron tool. Like I tend to opt for sword second due to its ability to keep me alive in the bottom strata, or a 2nd pick if I've worn through too much of the first to feel I can sustain myself at that tool level. Occasionally I'll opt for a shovel if I feel I need to clear out a large volume of dirt to try and gain access to a cave network if my mines dead end, or a hoe if I want to explore a large area and want to get hemp production up and running while I do so. Sometimes even shears if I luck out and find diamonds real quick.

I think the only tool I don't really ever opt for 2nd is the axe, but the 1st is inevitably a pick.

[ion]

i'm in the middle about pick or hoe here. depending on the surrounding area i make a pick or a hoe. i never make sword or shovel first as you can get those from zombies

[Sandrew]

The last time I started a new world (which should be well over a year ago now) I opted to go for hoe first. The idea was that I could secure food and kick-start my hemp farm while gathering more materials for a pick. A factor may have been the access to two ravines which gave me a good supply of easy iron ore. All in all, I can't for the life of me remember whether I saved any time in doing so, but I was going for a slow progression in my world anyway.

[woggy]

I went for a hoe, on account of i prioritized food over building things. It made things a bit slow with regards to mining, but I think it was worth it.

[kazerima]

I went with a hoe initially, if only to prevent the worst nightmare of every player from ever taking place. Getting the hoe first for me is always a must, that way I can always have one bastion in the world were I can count on food existing somewhere as a farm. After the first base though I think it might depend a bit more on the situation, though I find more access to food (and less deaths) to be a bit more useful in my case.

[Serling]

I used to be all about scrambling to craft and Iron Hoe and start a Pumpkin farm right away, only to find myself spending days thereafter doing little more than waiting for my one chicken to spawn others because I usually find my 18 iron before I've got a good stockpile of food and resources to build.

Iron Pick all day, everyday!

:edit:
First Iron Ingot ALWAYS goes to a Fishing Rod though...

[william711]

I go for a pick because I usually get enough iron to make another pick or a hoe or both very quickly after getting my first pick. my second tool is usually a hoe so I can get hemp going. I've never really found a sword that necessary mainly because I mine very cautiously (dirt walls cover up every passage way pretty much). for most of my deaths, it would not have made a difference whether I had stone axes or a sword so I see swords as wasteful until I have renewable Iron.

[EtherealWrath]

There isn't an exact answer; and what you do will differ from world to world.

My last run was hoe first, then pickaxe, shears, pick, pick, and finally cauldon + pick.
Or it would have been a cauldron had I not lost my last 30 ore, pick, and shears down a sinkhole on the way out.

Swords, shovels and armour aren't crafted- I pay the iron price for such a luxury ;)

[FlowerChild]

I go for a pick because I usually get enough iron to make another pick or a hoe or both very quickly after getting my first pick. my second tool is usually a hoe so I can get hemp going. I've never really found a sword that necessary mainly because I mine very cautiously (dirt walls cover up every passage way pretty much). for most of my deaths, it would not have made a difference whether I had stone axes or a sword so I see swords as wasteful until I have renewable Iron.

See, a personal rule of "don't go into the bottom strata without a sword" prevents one of my most common causes of death, as at one point my triumphant cheer of "yay! diamonds!" was almost inevitably followed by sounds of me weeping :)

That likely comes down almost entirely to personal play style though. Without one I tend to wind up trapped face to face with creepers and the iron sword gives me just enough wiggle room to bail myself out of that. The ability to block also helps a heck of a lot if you start getting sniped by a skeleton.

Now granted, this is largely insurance against my own stupidity in certain situations, but having had it happen enough times to know that it's a pretty ingrained habit for me, I try to take preemptive measures to reduce the likelihood of it getting me killed :)

[destineternel]

Last time I did a early game start it was a hoe as first iron tool. To get an early start on renewable food and hemp really fits my gameplay. I'll spend hours gathering coal and iron with stone tools which I find calming as it keeps me from the lower stratas.

[Sockthing]

My first iron tool is a pick, just so i can get more iron quicker and that i can get coal and cobble much quicker. Then the second iron tool is either hoe or axe, depending how much food i have gathered. Axe because I can gather wood quicker and it gives me a better weapon than stone axes. Sometimes my second tool is another pick, since i use the first a lot on cobble and coal :P

[Palisight]

Hoe: One of the biggest bottlenecks in the tech progression is waiting for hemp to grow

By the time you harvest 57 hemp, you will probably have enough iron for a iron pick, a iron sword (assuming you don't get one with decent durability from a zombie), and have found the gold and redstone needed for a Gearbox

If you are playing on multiplayer, the hoe is also important for "all the food you could possibly want until your next hardcore spawn". In singleplayer that aspect isn't nearly as important as animal slaughtering will easily feed you for a quite a long time

[DaveYanakov]

My first tool depends very heavily on whether I've found pumpkins to lure chickens with. Hoes are generally far more useful to me than an iron pick thanks to my hoarder tendencies and obsessive methodology regarding caves. I will make a pick when extensive caves simply are not exposed to the surface.

I did once start with shears when I spawned near jungle and the boost in getting food set up thanks to being able to lure milk factories around was considerable. It also meant that my sheep kept me armored at all times until I met a well hidden spider while trying to slash and burn my way deeper into the trees.

[Rawny]

Pick is usually the way I go. Gathering is just so much quicker. I like sword as a second tool.
Now, throw in me finding pumpkin seeds at any point and I get real tempted to make the hoe, at any time, even first. I don't mind taking it nice and slow, with patience and safety skills (many from the wise DestinE).
I like the sword not only for surviving mobs but the butchery of animals... Now more than ever, you gotta bring them down hard and fast.
Shears, SO tempting every time! Shovel, SO fast and it's just one ingot, cmon, you can spare it!

The props to a game when you have stop and think and plan.

(Lol, slightly ninja'ed by Mr. Dave. :)

[myrkana]

pick first just about everytime, I tend to b ase near ravines so it allows me the ability to easily pick the rest of the iron on the walls and get myself a hoe, sword, and another pick faster

[mc_isaac]

For me it really depends on the cave system(s) i'm currently exploring and whether or not I've found pumpkins yet. Every play through I seem to do it a different way based on certain play variables.

If I'm running out of natural cave I prefer a pick as I know i'll be digging more.
If I know that I'm going to be settling full time in the area I'm currently at I prefer to get shears and a hoe so it's easier to secure livestock (before it all dies) and I can start a pumpkin farm and start increasing my chicken population.
If it's a huge cave and I've got 27 iron and know there is way more iron there I might go shears as the only thing that ever catches me off guard and kills me is a creeper. I just run from everything else and block off cave arms to stay safe.
I almost always go shears before sword as it's a multi-use tool (animals, creepers, etc...) and also you can find swords randomly from zombies. I have issues with having creeper holes and lag sometimes causing a creeper to hurt me way more than they should, so i like shears a lot.
I always have shears and pick before making a sword. (but I always keep my eye out for free swords) If I run into instances in a cave where I need a sword I just run away :) as even with a sword if you don't have good armor and pots you could die accidentally anyway.

In my opinion there isn't a "best choice" for all circumstances. The best option of what iron tool to make first depends on your play style and what you want to start accomplishing right then.

[ThePowerofTower]

So I finally got that final iron, and made a pick.

Very pleased. I actually had a brief stint of strip-mining in the middle stratus for some stone/iron, got some shears, and started collecting oysters. Gonna get some cows, now that I have leather armor, gonna be unnecessarily ballsy.

So far, pleased enough to get shears second. I like the flexibility I get from shears; now I can disarm creepers, efficient leather use (which is any leather use for me) and soon vine traps. Might try hoe when I die. Y'know, from being unnecessarily ballsy.

[Nyoike]

I normally go for a pick first, but if I have access to pumpkins and there is a lot of surface or first strata iron still around after I get 2 ingots I make a hoe, and then follow that with a pick.

[ScubaPlays]

First iron tool for me is always a pick, even the second or third depending on how much iron I find at one time. Basically I always make sure I have enough ore to make a pick (as well as enough birch logs) in my storage before I consider making another tool. It's just easier to grab a large amount of iron at a time with an iron pick rather than a stone one.

In my recent life after making my third iron pick (because I just wasn't find too much extra iron), I finally started coming across some nice veins and was able to make an iron sword, iron hoe, and sheers all at once while still having enough ore on reserve for my next pick.

The stone version of the axe or shovel aren't too terrible (they don't feel as limiting as the stone pick) so I always do those last. The iron versions are definitely an upgrade but I like to craft the tools I don't currently have access to before them.