Ore Excavation — Guide

Getting Started

Find the key bind. Open Options -> Controls and look for the new Vein Mine key. By default it is bound to the grave / backtick key (`) - the key above Tab on most keyboards. Rebind it to anything you like.
Equip the right tool for the block you want to mine (a pickaxe for ores, an axe for logs). By default the correct tool is required.
Hold the Vein Mine key and break a block in an ore vein or a tree. The whole connected group is mined at once.
Release the key to go back to normal one-block-at-a-time mining.

That is the entire core loop: hold the key, break one block, harvest the whole vein.

How Vein Mining Works

When you break a block while holding the Vein Mine key, the mod runs a bounded flood-fill search outward from the block you hit, collecting every connected block of the same eligible type, and breaks them all in the same action.

Only blocks that are directly connected to the one you broke are included - a separate, non-touching deposit of the same ore is left alone.
Only blocks of the same type are included - mining one iron-ore block will not pull in an adjacent gold-ore block.
The search is bounded by the configured maximum block count and maximum radius so a single swing can never run away across the whole world.
Connectivity mode is configurable: by default it uses straight 6-direction adjacency; enabling diagonals uses full 26-neighbour adjacency so blocks touching only at a corner are still included.

Drops, experience, and tool durability are applied per block as the vein is harvested.

Limits & Balance

Several limits keep vein mining fair and prevent lag or griefing, all adjustable in the config:

Maximum blocks per excavation - a hard cap on how many blocks a single swing can mine (default 64). Even a huge connected deposit stops at the cap.
Maximum radius - the cascade is confined to a cube of this size around the block you hit, so very long veins are bounded.
Cooldown - an optional minimum number of ticks between excavations per player, useful on multiplayer servers.
Bonus experience - an optional extra XP reward per cascaded block, on top of normal block XP.

Because these are server-side, server owners can tune exactly how powerful vein mining is for everyone on the server.

Usage Tips

Strip-mine faster: hold the key while clearing ore pockets to scoop entire deposits in one click.
Clear forests instantly: chop the base log of each tree with the key held to fell whole trunks for fast wood gathering.
Save your good tools: remember each block costs durability - carry a backup or an Unbreaking/Mending tool for big veins.
Tune the cap for your playstyle: lower max_blocks for a gentle quality-of-life boost, or raise it for aggressive harvesting.
Use diagonals for messy ore: enable diagonal connectivity if you find natural ore blobs leaving stray blocks behind.
Blacklist sensitive blocks: add anything you do not want swept up (e.g. a particular block on a server) to the blacklist.

Multiplayer & Servers

Ore Excavation is server-aware and safe for multiplayer. The limits, cooldown, tool requirement, and eligible-block settings all live in the server-side config, so they are enforced consistently for every player.

Set a cooldown to stop players spamming huge excavations.
Keep max blocks and max radius modest to prevent lag from very large cascades.
Use the blacklist to protect specific blocks.
Because activation requires the player to hold the key, normal mining is unaffected for anyone who is not using the feature.

Eligible Blocks

Which blocks can be vein-mined is decided by block tags, not a fixed hardcoded list. Out of the box this covers the usual ores and logs, and because it is tag-driven it automatically extends to ores and logs added by other content that register under the same tags.

Ores - break one, harvest the connected deposit.
Logs - break one, fell the whole trunk.
Other tagged blocks - any block that belongs to an eligible tag is included automatically.

A blacklist lets you explicitly exclude specific blocks even if they would otherwise qualify, so you can fine-tune exactly what vein mining applies to.

Tool & Activation Rules

Ore Excavation gates vein mining so it behaves like a natural extension of survival mining rather than a free dig-everything button:

Hold-to-activate - vein mining only happens while you hold the Vein Mine key. Mining without the key behaves exactly like vanilla (one block).
Correct tool required - by default you must be holding the proper tool for the block (a pickaxe for ores, an axe for logs). This can be turned off in the config.
Durability cost - the held tool loses durability for every block in the vein, just as if you had mined them individually. If the tool breaks mid-cascade, the cascade stops cleanly.
Silk Touch and fortune are honoured - enchantments on the held tool apply to every block in the vein, so Silk Touch yields the ore block itself and Fortune boosts drops as normal.