A Meteorite is an unnatural Biome that can appear on the surface of the world during the night after destroying a Shadow Orb or a Pulsating Heart or at random every night with a 2% chance, after one Shadow Orb or Pulsating Heart has been destroyed in the world.
A Meteorite falling is announced in the bottom-left of the screen with the message, "A meteorite has landed!" This event will always occur off-screen — a player can never witness the actual impact. However, you can see a Meteorite in the background right before a Meteorite lands.
The Meteorite itself is normally made up of approximately 350 blocks of Meteorite Ore, but this largely depends on where it lands. In particular, if the Meteorite spawns on a Skybridge, it will only cover a width of ~20 blocks through the depth of the Skybridge.
The ore found in this biome requires a Platinum or Gold Pickaxe or better to mine, and inflicts 5 damage per second (not affected by defense) and the On Fire! to players who directly touch it. This damage can be nullified entirely by equipping an Obsidian Skull, Obsidian Shield, or Obsidian Horseshoe, or by drinking an Obsidian Skin Potion or with Lava Waders.(not Hardmode.)
A really easy way to find one is using the minimap, and then when one lands, you can press M to try to find where it is.
No more meteors will fall if a certain amount of meteorite is present in the world. (See notes)
Monsters[]
When approaching a Meteorite crash site, Meteor Heads will spawn (though not from the actual Meteorite) in an attempt to hinder your excavation of the Meteorite, and the game's music will change to the Underworld theme. When there is less than 50 Meteorite Ore, the Meteor Heads will stop spawning, indicated by the music returning to normal.
Spawning Conditions[]
First the Eater of Worlds, or the Brain of Cthulhu must have been defeated. After that, a Meteorite has a 50% chance to spawn after the midnight after a Shadow Orb/Pulsating Heart is destroyed in the world (or immediately if the orb/heart is smashed after midnight but before dawn). So in order to maximize the amount of meteors that land on your world, only one Shadow Orb or Pulsating Heart should be destroyed every night. Destroying 5 Shadow Orbs in one night for example will not spawn 5 meteorites in your world but will most likely spawn only one.
In addition, every night after the first Shadow Orb/Pulsating Heart is destroyed has a 2% chance of having a Meteorite spawn so long as the amount of Meteorite Ore in the world is below a certain threshold. This means that any meteorite should be mined as soon as possible to maximize the amount of meteors that spawn.
Notes[]
- Meteorites spawn between 12:00am - 4:30am, which means breaking Shadow Orbs/Pulsating Hearts during that time is the ideal moment to do so, as the player will be instantly alerted if one spawns each time they break an orb/heart.
- Meteorites replace existing blocks in the area of impact, rather than delivering new blocks, and will impact on the first blocks it encounters at the highest possible altitude. Because of this, it may be worthwhile to destroy any Skybridge you have built before breaking any Shadow Orbs.
- Note that a Sky Bridge made of Inactive Stones is ignored. (Tested once. [1])
- Meteorites do not disappear.
- Meteor Heads have a 2% chance of dropping Meteorite.
- The spawning of Meteor Heads overrides the other enemy spawns in the area, making all other mobs disappear entirely until you leave the biome, in which regular mobs will begin spawning again. The area around the landed meteorite is a whole new biome that overrides other present biomes.
- Meteorites can fall anywhere on a map, which makes locating them difficult depending on the World Size.
- Meteorites can fall on Floating Islands, Dungeons, in Chasms and in the Ocean. If it is in the Ocean or on a Floating Island, Meteor Heads will still attack. It is even possible for Meteorites to fall right next to, or even on NPC settlements.
- When a Meteorite lands on a Floating Island or other land at a sufficient altitude, no Meteor Heads will appear, but the spawn rate of Harpies will increase instead, with as many as 6 appearing at one time.
- If a Meteorite falls on a Chasm, the Chasm will not become plugged up because the meteor is actually just a translation of existing blocks rather than a new lump of blocks.
- To protect your house, NPC settlements, or any other area from being destroyed by a Meteorite, you can make an 'umbrella' over the area. If you wish to still harvest Meteorite from any meteor that lands, you'll have to make the 'umbrella' much thicker; around 10 blocks thick would work, but is very costly in terms of resources. A stack of stone would make an umbrella about 99 blocks long.You can also protect your house from Meteorites by building it underground.
- The Vilethorn is useful against the Meteor Heads because in a single use, it deals enough damage to quickly destroy it. You can also use it through blocks before they have the chance to get to you. Alternatively, if you don't have the Vilethorn or a large mana pool, you can use the Blade of Grass. It has a large sweep and high damage, capable of taking out several meteor heads with one or two swings.
- Early players can "farm" meteorite heads with a knockback sword, earning about a silver a head.
- Meteors do not always fall when Shadow Orbs/Pulsating Hearts are broken.
- Plant life may spawn or grow on the fallen Meteorite. This could be because the meteorite only replaces blocks and doesn't collide with plants.
- Meteor heads will continue to spawn even if all of the Meteorite blocks are deactivated with actuators.
A WaterLeaf on top of a fallen Meteorite.
- Having a certain amount of Meteorite present in your world will prevent new meteors from falling. Depending on the world size the amount of meteorite needed is for small worlds: 401, medium worlds: 611, large worlds: 801. Placing these amounts of meteorite is another way to prevent new meteors from falling.
Mining Tips[]
- before 1.4 Dynamite is a very useful mining tool as it is quite powerful and can help excavate the meteor with a couple of simple explosions. Sticky Bombs can also be used to mine Meteorite, as they stick to blocks, letting you position explosions.
- A strategy for dealing with Meteor Heads early to mid game: If you have 10 of the same kind of gem, try to mine 60 pieces of Meteorite (enough for 20 bars), and craft a Phaseblade. With a Phaseblade, dealing with the Meteor Heads becomes much easier and should allow you to mine the entire area with few problems.
- With proper positioning, Meteor Heads can be repelled by your Pickaxe as you mine.
- If you wish to spawn Meteor Heads to gain their drops, place 50 blocks of Meteorite in close proximity, such as in a 7x7 box with one additional block extended (so you can quickly end the spawning when needed).
- The amount of meteorite needed to spawn Meteor Heads (50 blocks) sells for exactly one gold. However, you'd be better off with the bars because they seem to fetch more.
Bugs[]
- There is a bug that rarely occurs which summons Eye of Cthulhu even at daytime just after the last blocks of meteorite are mined. This only seems to happen before Eye of Cthulhu has been defeated in a world.
- Sometimes, if a meteorite has not landed in a world yet, the first time it says "A Meteorite has landed!" in that world a meteorite will not have actually landed, but the next time it says "A Meteorite has landed!", it will have landed.
- If the meteorite is in the Crimson or the Corruption, the soundtrack will not change.
- (iOS Bug) If two meteorites land within 8 hours, there is a rare chance of these two meteorites stacking, causing one meteorite tile to give double the ores.
- If a player places Meteorite unnaturally in the Crimson or Corruption, then Meteor Heads will not spawn, along with the previously mentioned soundtrack glitch. The same applies with invasions/ events, as those will always override other spawn rates, aside from very rare meteor head spawns, if the player moves back and forth very fast.
- When a meteorite spawns within the Jungle near a body of water, Piranhas will spawn in addition to Meteor Heads.
- When approaching a crashed meteor, underworld mobs will spawn infrequently.
Gallery[]
