Pottery
Clay is an incredibly useful and balanced material which can be used for pottery. It can prove challenging to locate at first. Clay is usually hidden by grass, but it is often found in two locations. In areas with at least 175mm Annual Rainfall, clay can be found in patches all over the place, usually marked by the presence of certain Plants.
Clay Indicators
Multiblock
Clay, with one of the plants that may indicate its presence.
Athyrium Fern, Canna, Goldenrod, Pampas Grass, Perovskia, and Water Canna all indicate the presence of clay nearby. Clay can also be found in smaller deposits close to water sources, such as rivers, lakes, or ponds.
Like with rocks, clay can be knapped to form new items. It requires five clay in your hand to knap. Unlike rocks, if you make a mistake, you can simply close the knapping interface, reshape your clay, and try again.
The Knapping Interface.
Small Vessel
The small vessel is one such item. Like all pottery items, it must be fired before it can be used. Firing is a process of heating the item up to a point where the clay will turn into a hard Ceramic material, which requires heating to 1400 °C, or Yellow White.
In order to do this in the early game, you will need to use a Pit Kiln.
Knapping a Clay Small Vessel.
Jug
Another useful pottery item is the Jug. It can be used to pick up and drink fluids, such as fresh water.
In order to use it, simply Right Click the jug on the fluid in the world. Then use the jug in order to drink from it. The jug can hold 100 mB of fluid at a time.
Knapping a Clay Jug.
Molds
Clay is also necessary for making Molds. Molds can have molten metal poured into them, which will eventually solidify into the shape of a mold. The item and potentially the mold can then be retrieved by using Right Click on the mold.
The most simple type of mold is the ingot mold, to the right.
Knapping a Clay Ingot Mold.
Yellow White****
The mold then needs to be fired, like all clay items, to be usable - likely in a Pit Kiln.
Once it is fired, molten metal can be poured in. Once the metal has cooled enough, it can be extracted.
Casting
Items: tfc:ceramic/ingot_mold{tank:{"Amount":100, "FluidName":"tfc:metal/copper"}}
The next few pages show several of the knapping patterns for various tools.
A Prospector's Pick is an essential tool for locating large quantities of ore.
A Pickaxe! The bread and butter tool for mining.
A Saw is a tool which is required in order to craft advanced wooden components like a Workbench along with many other devices like Supports.
A Scythe is a tool that can harvest plants and leaves in a 3x3x3 area!
A Chisel is a tool used for smoothing blocks as well as creating a large number of decorative blocks.
An Axe for all your tree chopping purposes. Note that stone axes are less efficient than metal!
A Hammer is an essential tool to create and work on Anvils.
A Knife can be used as a weapon, or as a cutting tool for plant type blocks.
A Hoe used for planting and maintaining Crops.
A Shovel for all your digging purposes.