Mining is one of the currently 23 skills in Old School RuneScape. When training mining, there are a few things you need to consider: click intensity or how focused you need to be while training the skill, how much OSRS GP you can make when training that particular skill, and the XP per hour you can get with the respective method. These three variables are linked, so if a method gives you loads of OSRS gold, it will probably be at the cost of high click intensity, lower XP rates, or both.
Most Used Ways of Training the Mining Skill
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The most used ways to train your Mining skill are the iron drop method for the fastest XP, mining fallen stars for the most afk method, the Shilo Village Gem Mine for excellent OSRS GP per hour, and the Motherload Mine for a medium income of OSRS gold at a relatively low click intensity. Other profitable methods include mining Amethyst or high-level ores like Runite ore. However, most other methods start to pay off after you have done your fair share of mining in the Motherload Mine. This is because here, you can obtain a few quality-of-life upgrades.
On top of giving you a fair amount of low click intensity and profit, mining at the Motherload Mine is highly relevant. From the perspective of quality-of-life upgrades, it is the only place to obtain the Prospector outfit, the gem bag, and the coal bag by exchanging the Motherload Mine currency, golden nuggets, with prospector Percy.
Ore Veins
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The Motherload Mine is pretty simple. You will only have to mine one type of resource: ore veins. Mining them will always yield paydirt and sometimes gems. If you want to receive more gems, simply wear an Amulet of Glory, as it will increase the chance that you mine a sapphire, emerald, ruby, or diamond alongside your paydirt. This can be especially useful for Ironman accounts, but getting the Amulet of Glory might take some time. If you already have a gem bag, it will only cost you one inventory spot to get the extras; however, it could be counterintuitive as the gems won’t give you any additional XP.
The Motherload Mine has two levels, and the ore veins at the first level behave differently than the ones at the second level. In contrast, the first level of the mine is available for everyone with an active membership and a minimum level of 30 Mining. For the second level of the mine, you will need level 72 Mining to have purchased the unlock from Prospector Percy for 100 Golden Nuggets. In comparison, the lower-floor ore veins deplete more often, and based on chance when mining, the upper-level ones deplete after a set amount of time.
Paydirt
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The Motherload Mine resembles a real mine; sometimes rocks can fall and hurt you if you’re in their way. But most often, they will block the passage and prevent you from freely moving through the mine. As inconvenient as they might be, they will give you 10 Mining XP when you clear the path.
You will have to take each inventory of paydirt and deposit it in a hopper to clean it and discover what ore you have mined. You can deposit multiple inventories before you empty the sack, but once the paydirt reaches the sack, you will gain additional bonus XP for the ore you have mined. Upgrade the sack for 200 golden nuggets to hold even more resources.
The ore you can mine depends on your current mining level, and boosts usually only work to get better types of ore you would not be able to get with your base level. The ore is also decided when you mine it, not when you clean it, so holding onto paydirt and picking the ore from the sack after you have leveled up won’t work either.
Sometimes when retrieving the ore from the sack, you will also get some golden nuggets. Some mining levels will give you a better chance to get golden nuggets, so if you’re here for the uniques, you might want to capitalize on this. When you’re at levels 43, 57, 71, 85, and 99, you will get a 3.13 percent chance that the paydirt you mine is a golden nugget instead of the regular 2.73 percent. The difference is not huge, but it can add up. You will use the golden nuggets to buy the rewards and unlocks from Prospector Percy, which you can find near the bank in the Motherload mine.
Rewards
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The most hunted reward is the Prospector’s outfit. You will need 180 golden nuggets for it, and you cannot sell it to other players or buy it from other players for OSRS gold. Besides this, you can buy a gem bag, which is a fantastic addition to some Slayer tasks. You can also get a handy coal mine, especially as an ironman with OSRS accounts for sale. If you’re done buying all of the uniques, you could also make some additional profit by trading your golden nuggets for soft clay packs or bags full of gems which you can open and then sell on the GE for some OSRS gold.